SquarePeg Books

I made a goal in August 2015 to rough out, from start to finish, Fantasy book 3, by Christmas 2015.

I knew it was a bit of a quagmire, but I already had 250 pages of notes and scenes scribbled out, and I knew where I wanted the story to go and what I needed the reader to see so I could advance my world enough so that when a reader picked up book 4 they wouldn’t ask “The fuck is this shit?” (They might still ask that in book 3, but theoretically they’d be a bit more forgiving because they’d understand I lobbed a low-yield nuke into the middle of my world and now they’re watching the fallout.) I knew substantial changes needed to be made to my notes and the written bits I kept – the initial intent of the story is the same, but the initial notes were too cute.

I think I realized, subconsciously, that I was on low battery power, and if things were going to get done, then they would have to get done before or by the holidays.

Nope. Did not happen.

I was tired.

Not just tired, but too tired.

Fantasy Book 3 is stomped all over me. My Steampunk wouldn’t talk to me. Romance Book 2 wouldn’t feel a connection with me.

My books didn’t like me.

To be fair, I don’t like most people, either, so I suppose if my books are extensions of me, then it only makes sense that they learned to be hateful little shits by example.

I wanted to leave. I wanted to drop the kids with the grandparents and take a two week road trip. Alone. That way, I wouldn’t have to worry about anyone losing their minds because I decided to toss out the itinerary for a day or two because of a shiny squirrel I saw on the side of the road.

I didn’t do it though. There was no time I could budget for it. There was no money to budget for it.

Here we are, 4 years later, and I still desperately feel the need to run away.

I dropped the volunteer things, and that seemed to remove quite a bit of stress. For about 6 months, everything started to  turn around. It took time to get the writing corner organized to write again. It took time to re-read the book 3 slap-dash printout/draftish notes/the-hell-is-this? and then review notes (that were scattered everywhere, despite my best attempts at keeping them organized). It took time to begin dissecting and find the best method of cut, move, add, pad, trim, tuck and fold that would work for Fantasy book 3. Progress was slow, but it was progress.

Then, a land-mine exploded and shit has not been the same since early August 2018. Everything came to a screeching halt. Once more, I was the only one who could carry the whole load.  Once more, I had to become some kind of bizarre scheduling contortionist capable of doing everything for the family and more.

Unwanted realities set in. Writing is nice, but thus far, it hasn’t paid shit because I’ve not enough material or money to start publishing.

Reality stares at me from across a desk. “Responsibility demands you go back to work. Full-time, ideally. To do less is to be a selfish little shit living in denial of the future.”

Fantasy Book 3 looks at me longingly from my desk. The wrong Steampunk wants to have a conversation, but at least it’s connected to the 1st, in an abstract way. Romance Book 2 smiles at me.

I work on them, and my goals of working on them have yielded progress, but the time investment to make progress and the financial risk of publishing scratches at the back of my mind.

It makes it more difficult to shut out the voices of my parents, who insist writing is a dead-end future that goes nowhere, and maybe I should try bending my efforts at making and selling craftsy things instead (yes, that is a real suggestion from my mother, who doesn’t seem to understand that most crafting sales, be it etsy or at shows or wherever, only pay just enough to make the next craft. Much like writing is for a lot of people). My father has offered to pay for me to go back to school to get another cert or something that would possibly help me acquire a job that pays something close to a living wage, the way writing never will (in his eyes). The problem is that just because you get a cert, doesn’t mean you land a job with it.

My husband wants me to stick it out. He wants me to write. He wants me to publish. He believes that I can make it a success.

It’s normally hard to take a step back and look at things objectively. When you’ve been running on a near negative charge for years, it’s more than normally hard. It’s damned near impossible.

The last few weeks, I’ve not written at all. Spring Break with the monkeys. Errands. House fixing. Chores.

Doubt.

It’s hard to tell if it’s the low battery, or if it’s that I’m plugged into the wrong device and while I can run it, it isn’t very efficient for either of us, and potentially increases the risk of destruction of the device and myself, since we’re not completely compatible.

All I do know is that I’m gonna need to charge up soon, or things are going to get spectacularly ugly.