Did you ever have one of those days, one of those days where everything you read back of your own writing sounds terrible?
Just one of those days where nothing sounds right at all, where on hearing the words read back is torture inflicted.
Fingernails scratching along a blackboard, the sound of your own voice when heard.
Everyone, with very few exceptions,
Hates the sound of their own voice heard back.
The writer’s curse.
Rubbish!
Blah!
Self-doubt with every syllable I hear.
One of those days.
This past week brought the seventy-two-year anniversary of the death of one of my literary idols. Lucy Maud Montgomery passed away in Toronto and left behind a loveable character with red hair and a temper, who is a big part of Canada for me. For me, Montgomery’s imagination was one-of-a-kind. It was her escape from a life of loneliness and hardship, of which I can not imagine.
A glimpse into the woman she was can be found in her journals. I have heard snippets of them in the past, but have yet to find full versions easily accessible. I guess this blog is mine. I can’t help wondering if Montgomery would have a blog if she were alive today.
I am sure she too had times of feeling like her words were rubbish, off days where nothing came out right. I think about this on just these off days in my own writing. How did she deal with those feelings of inadequacy? Where did she find the courage to move forward?
http://lucymaudmontgomery.ca/resources/
I find it again. My inspiration returns and I live to write another day. I find things about my own writing to be proud of once more. I am constantly inspired by Montgomery’s sweeping imagination and I strive to become the best writer I can be.
I have a file-in-progress on my laptop. It contains the first draft of a story I’ve had in my head, muddling around in there, begging to be written down for several years now. I saw my chance last November, when I heard about something known as NaNoWriMo or National Novel Writing Month. I am sure I had it in me all along, but this was the thing I seemed to need to offer the right amount of motivation. Of course it has been sitting there since November. I reached their fifty thousand word goal, but it is in need of an ending.
I planned, from the start, to post bits of my NaNoWriMo 2014 novel in progress on Fiction Fridays, but yesterday I chickened out. I read the first few paragraphs to myself and cringed, not ever-so-slightly. I just couldn’t post them.
I guess that’s how it goes sometimes, for writers. I am sure others feel the same way with their own artistic interests. I have the NANO swag now, but my story felt unworthy. Just one of those days or the truth; sometimes it’s hard to tell.
I still plan on posting it, in the weeks to come of course. I am not sure how happy with it I am, seeing as it’s the first try. I recently heard an excellent term used when describing that awful pieced-together attempt: Franken-Draft. I could immediately relate to this image.
In a few weeks I will have some new photos of myself for this blog, the benefit of having a talented photographer in the family. I know he can understand what I speak of here.
Just one of those days…
“I cannot remember the time when I was not writing or when I did not mean to be an author.” – L.M. Montgomery
Her Headache 