desk notes 30.9.24

an update from my writing desk

Full disclosure - it really annoys me (as a reader) when writers here on Substack offer ‘previews’ of the content they reserve for their paid subscribers. I find it jarring to be cut off, mid-read, and so now avoid even starting something that’s tagged as a preview. I get why they do it - it’s meant to entice you into wanting to upgrade your subscription and I absolutely support writers being paid for their work, so if that’s a useful marketing tool for them, fine. You do you. I just don’t like it. That said, I would like to share one of the little extras I offer those who are able to offer financial support for my work here. So instead of posting it as a ‘preview’, I’m publishing the whole thing. I’m working on additional extras to thank my patrons in the future, but I’m still grappling with balancing my values of equitable access with my need to make a living 🤪.

Hello, friends…I hope this finds you well.

We’re officially in autumn now, though summer seems intent on outstaying her welcome. It’s the time of cool mornings - creeping fogs and heavy dews - that morph into hot afternoons; sweater-on-sweater-off days. You can almost feel the season shifting.

It’s at this time of year - the time of wasps and spiders - that I feel most unwanted in my garden and so tend to skirt around the edges, muttering apologies for having walked through someone’s web or veering away from the wasps and their mad-eyed, addict behaviour over the last of the raspberries and blackberries. At some point, I concede the rest of the harvest to them and limit my interactions to trips to the compost pile and aimless wandering to admire the asters and black-eyed susans. There’s a primal hush in my wild and slightly overgrown patch, as all of the garden people turn their attention to the shift in season…some to die back into the earth, some to prepare for the cold months ahead. It’s an ancient, dependable cycle and I take comfort in the rhythm of it, knowing that I’m not apart from it and that to surrender to this natural, wise and eternal order of things is the only sane way to live.

September has been a bit of a mixed bag, writing-wise. I’ve made some wonderful progress in my first draft while, at the same time, have bumped up against some old doubts and narratives. That knocked me off stride for a few days and I lost my momentum a bit. It’s par for the course, I think. Baldric sees me on a roll and gets nervous, lest I get ideas above my station 😉. Thankfully, we’ve danced this dance often enough that I know to simply humour him and wait for his hysteria to pass.

I’ve been thinking a lot about writing as a practice - that being different than writing as an activity. I received an email from a writer I used to follow years ago - it was one of those automated, list-cleaning emails along the lines of “you haven’t opened my letters for a while (I hadn’t been getting them but whatever) and here’s a free course to tempt you back.” She runs a writing school, an alternate MFA type thing and in another life I may have taken one of her classes. As it is, they’re quite pricey and I’m not certain my plebeian fiction would have a place among the more literary aspirations of her target audience. Anyway, the free class she offered was on her principles of writing…so I figured, hey, it’s free, why not? Funnily enough, the things she teaches are things - practices - that I’m familiar with and have, off and on, adopted into my writing life. Things like noticing, writing intuitively and mindfully, reading critically etc. It’s got me thinking about how I’ve become a bit too workaday with my writing, expecting it to perform without offering it any sustenance. I’ve become too focused on the end goal (finishing the rough draft) and am perhaps neglecting the more spiritual aspects of my craft. Because writing, for me, is very much a spiritual practice…but more on that another time.

Current manuscript(s)

Yes, still beavering away with Hazel 2.

I’m enjoying myself (mostly) and despite having hoped to do a bit more outlining and be a bit more ‘directive’ (all in aid of avoiding a big mess for Editing Mel to have to deal with) it seems things are quite out of my hands. New (and interesting) characters have wandered in and there are story lines evolving that I really hadn’t expected. I don’t know if all of them will ultimately stay (the characters will but the story lines may not) but it’s pointless for me to try and make these decisions now. I’m going to trust the process.

I’ve also had nigglings about a couple of other projects that I’ve begun and set aside over the past few years. I’m toying with the idea of perhaps working on them simultaneously (?) but am not sure if my brain can handle that! I’d consider it an experiment in sustainability as I’m wondering if having other things to play with, I won’t become ‘tired’ of the harder slog of writing the drafts for Hazel 2. The ‘working on them’ would just be brainstorming and daydreaming, perhaps some character sketches… a form of play, in other words. Still, as fellow writers know, there’s danger lurking in doing that…the siren song of the ‘new, shiny’….so I’m going to think about that for a bit longer.

For interest - they’re a Beauty and the Beast retelling (currently called Project Snowfall) and a romantasy based on a short story I wrote years ago called Iron and Hawthorn. I’ll be sharing more about them as we go along.

Word count

As of yesterday, the manuscript is standing at 27,694 words. I managed to keep to my five day writing week schedule, up until last week when I had my Wobble when I missed a couple of days. I’m finding the Silent Scribble sessions to be soooo helpful…they give me firm structure in the week, not to mention the quiet camaraderie, and that’s been invaluable. Those, and my Friday mornings with my writing group are definitely an anchor.

Mind set

As I mentioned above, I had a bit of a Wobble last week. I’m starting to see these as points of reflection - they feel like early warning signals, opportunities to check-in with myself. Oftentimes, it’s revealed that I’ve fallen out of alignment and need to do a little course-correcting. This time it was because, as I mentioned, I’ve been getting too caught up in the activity of writing and neglecting the practice. I was focusing on word-count and productivity. This is all part and parcel of the damage that capitalism has done to me in the realm of my creativity. I sometimes regret stepping into the indie publishing realms as they’re very much productivity/profit focused…and fair enough, I do want to make a living wage with my words. But my brain…oh, my brain!..it can be so literal, so black-and-white. That’s okay, I’m figuring it out.

What’s inspiring me

Ah, so much good stuff floating around in my Thinker these days! Here’s a little list of some of the things I’m mulling over…

still with the angels and demons, the Book of Enoch, fairytales and folktales, the power of place, plants - ohmygoodness! the miracle of plants!, bacteria and viruses - are they actually the puppet-masters here?, microbiology in general - one of my ‘roads-not-taken’, slow writing and slow reading, muse-based philosophies, writing (and living) into the dark, stillness and retreat for deeper connection - it’s not withdrawal from the world, rather a deepening…bearded scholars, a life of books and study, screen time vs. green time…

There we are, my friends — the view from the other side of the screen. 🤓

Thank you again for being here — I have to pinch myself sometimes, imagining myself so fortunate to have your support for this work. It’s a beautiful dream.

As always, feel free to contact me with any questions, comments or requests…and know that I deeply, deeply appreciate you.

Until next time….

~m. xo