“The middle of every successful project looks like a disaster.”
– R.M. Kanton
Hi Writers:
Each month I begin this newsletter filled with energy and great intentions. I start with a few stray thoughts and a folder full of e-mails. I open Eudora, copy last month’s newsletter into a fresh e-mail, delete the items that are no longer current, and open the folder marked New Events. Things move along famously for awhile. I hum to myself. The sky is blue. I’ve allotted the requisite three days and I have that fine feeling in my stomach similar to how I feel after I’ve eaten one third of a brownie and there’s still two thirds to go.
Then things go awry. The cell phone rings. It’s my husband. His car has broken down and he needs a ride to the repair shop. The land line rings. It’s Mother. She has a doctor’s appointment and needs a ride to the clinic. The bell signaling new email rings and I find seven new events which must be added to this month’s issue. Just about this time it dawns on me that I have simply no clue what to write in this month’s essay. I have seen no good quotes, heard not a bit of salient writing advice, and I fear I don’t have one wit of experience, strength or hope to share with even the most beginning beginner writer. I look outside. It’s raining.
As if on cue, a very noisy unkind voice in my mind says, “Hang it up. Go take a bath or a nap or sit in the back yard in the rain and stare at the grass until you turn green.” And sometimes a break helps. More often, however, a little voice inside me says, “Just keep going. It will work itself out.” When I hear that voice, I listen. See, I’ve been writing for nearly twenty years. I recognize the process. I can almost smell that point approaching when I want to throw up my hands and say, “That’s it! This time I can’t get it done!”
I don’t know how or why, but if I keep working something clicks. I open an email from a friend and read the perfect quote for this month’s essay. I keep typing and one by one all the events, changes and additions appear out of the disorder of my mind and onto the screen as legible bits of the English language we fondly refer to as sentences. The clock slows down and what I feared would take three days gets done in the three hours I have left. Somehow, someway, before midnight on the third of the month each and every month, I hit SEND and my creation magically flies through cyberspace and lands in each subscriber’s inbox.
So the next time you get to that place where it looks like you’re on the Titanic and you’re taking on water, remember — you’re not. You’re in your own little boat. Get out the oars and row.
Nita(row, row, rowing my boat)Sweeney
(c) 2004 by Nita Sweeney
