“Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a long bout of some painful illness. One would never undertake such a thing if one were not driven on by some demon whom one can neither resist nor understand.” —George Orwell
This is my world lately. The story demon won’t come out but festers inside, banging against my heart.
Starting a new book can be a wonderful event underlying with doubt, fear, and the unknowing. And getting stuck in the middle of a book can be even worse. Every writer goes through times where the words won’t flow – or perhaps it’s all the wrong words, the wrong book. But to keep at it we write anyways. Clunky words. Terrible prose. Boring dialogue. We have to write through it to get to the other side. And sometimes give up one story for the true story we must write. There is no going over and under – only through.
There are times in a writing life where your words become stuck, frozen over in an empty winter.
My words got stuck last weekend. This was me.
I was free falling.
And then I was like …
I did all the things you do when stuck.
I journalled in character voice.
I free wrote.
I went for a bike ride.
I read writing resource books and took notes.
I read fiction.
No. No. No. Finally I stood up and yelled “I’m done!”
I turned off my computer. I put away my notebooks. I threw myself into manual labor around the house. Hauling things here and there. Diving into projects that had been waiting for attention while I was “writer-ing”.
And the whole time dang-and-blasting-it to no one in particular (my family was away camping). I questioned my writer existence.
Why am I writing this particular story? Should I go back to writing that other story? What kind of writer am I? What kind of writer do I want to be? Is this what this life is like – becoming lost and found … and lost again, over and over?
Oh, yes, we writers are D-R-A-M-A-T-I-C.
“Who wants to become a writer? And why? Because it’s the answer to everything. … It’s the streaming reason for living. To note, to pin down, to build up, to create, to be astonished at nothing, to cherish the oddities, to let nothing go down the drain, to make something, to make a great flower out of life, even if it’s a cactus.” —Enid Bagnold
I labored all weekend throwing myself into physical projects that needed no exhausting thought behind them. All the while a fierce fist clenched my innards, oppressing my story. The demon had me and wouldn’t let go. I could hear its tormenting laugh telling me, “I will only let your story go when I feel like it!”
More dang-and-blast-its and then tears and then more dang-and-blast-its!
Perhaps it had to do with the fact my life has been bogged down as well. My husband and I have spent weeks going through everything my parents owned. My mother died a few years ago and my father downsized and shipped the entire contents of their life up to us in storage. 50 years of a shared life – a “collector’s” life, from their many relocations and European trips.
I was stuck in a past-life flood torrent.
Opening that storage unit was like opening a black hole and being sucked in. Box after box dominated our house. It looked like an episode of Hoarder’s. Besides the clutter jarring my senses, opening each box required diving into memories. Some funny. Some sad.
And then there was the ‘what do we do with it?’ Re-arrange. Make room. Two yard sales. One pick-up from Purple Heart. Bikes in the kitchen. A couch in the garage. A treadmill in the dining room. Many ads on Craig’s List. One downsized storage unit to a smaller unit with furniture we couldn’t make room for … but I couldn’t part with.
Then the emotional fray of pricing objects that were a part of my childhood and my mother long gone. It was saying goodbye to her all over again.
And then the added emotional fray of ‘why did I sell that?’ Ridiculous things like … a chamber pot. My mother had used them as trash baskets. I grew up with them. They were part of the landscape. Where did she get them? Were they from the working farm she grew up on in Kentucky? I visited it when she passed away. There it sits going back to nature in the woods.
Was this sold chamber pot part of my history and I let it go for $3.50? (I seriously want to know who went you-know in that pot!).
Tears. Over a sold chamber pot. Seriously.
Remember. D-R-A-M-A-T-I-C.
At least I saved one. One is all you need. One of the right memory. The right story.
And chamber pots. Sort of fitting as I research medieval toilets for the young adult fantasy I am writing … err … or NOT writing at the moment.
Maybe I am putting too much pressure on myself. To write this story. To not let go. And I laugh as I think about what my mother would say. “Time to move on.” She would be right. She’s in my heart forever, not in any household item.
I need to let go. Of objects burdening me over the loss of my mother. Of the book I “must” write. Stuck by loss of story and sentiment.
Just let go.
And here’s the thing … there are no rules when it comes to writing a book. Each writer’s way is unique yet we all reach the same destination. Sounds pretty amazing, doesn’t it? What other job can be done so differently by every single person and yet have the same end product? A novel.
As I sifted through my parent’s past I also sifted through events, people, places, and ideas. And that fierce fist inside loosened.
Somewhere deeply hidden things began to burble.
A creative force fills my chest near bursting. I can feel the story inside. I feel the passion, the pain. I hear its music soaring. I well with emotion that cannot be contained. It sits in my fragile, broken place waiting to be pieced together from bits of me. This story that is yet to be. For I know it will be.
So … I let go. And I wait.
Waiting for the “unstuck”. And in the waiting a glimmer shines inside. The glimmer of the story I should be writing.
I pick up my pen and notebook and … I … begin. Beginnings are the best … but we need endings for them to happen.
And I take to heart what Ray Bradbury recommends.
“Let the world burn through you. Throw the prism light, white hot, on paper.”
—Ray Bradbury, WD
For I know that burning is better than never having been on fire at all.

Donna…I have been stuck with my third novel for weeks, but I was too busy to do anything about it. Time helps deal with the problem, but my wife and I are sitting here in France and have consumed massive amounts of wine and one day I woke up with a bad headache and the realization that my stuck condition had been cured!!!!! Don’t do anything stupid, but a little wine gets the demons drunk and they just fall out of your head.
Lee
Oh, Lee, you always make me laugh! I have so been enjoying your travel blog about France. I must get there again to lose my story demons!
Donna- I can relate to being stuck. I think sometimes I am stuck when I am overwhelmed with regular life and work. I have so much going on that it takes longer to lose myself because I think of the things I should be doing (work and chores).
I am sorry to hear you have been stuck- but it sounds like you got a lot of other work done! I can imagine going through your parents’ things was hard and certainly stirred up a lot of memories. I think one chamber pot sounds like just the right number. 😉
Glad you have a new story brewing getting ready for you to tell it. Good luck and happy thinking and writing. 🙂
Stephanie, thanks for the encouragement! We can feel stuck in many ways, not just in writing too. And when life overwhelms, it’s hard to find that extra time to get “unstuck” in writing. I often have that dream where I am trying to get somewhere but I am paralyzed and never make it. Frustrating! Happy “unstucking” to you. 🙂
Donna- I can relate to being stuck. I think sometimes I am stuck when I am overwhelmed with regular life and work. I have so much going on that it takes longer to lose myself because I think of the things I should be doing (work and chores).
I am sorry to hear you have been stuck- but it sounds like you got a lot of other work done! I can imagine going through your parents’ things was hard and certainly stirred up a lot of memories. I think one chamber pot sounds like just the right number. 😉
Gld you have a new story brewing getting ready for you to tell it. Good luck and happy thinking and writing. 🙂
Beautiful post, Donna!! It seems like this type of writing might help you to work through the “feeling stuck”, like there is all of this other stuff that needs to be expressed as part of the process of writing whatever story you are going to write.
Paul, I agree! I think we get stuck for a reason some times and it can lead to other things we might not have sought out. 🙂
Donna, this is such a great post, so filled with truths, and hilarious gifs 🙂 Seriously, you have a gift for the gifs, no joke.
But on a more serious note, you really illuminate what is is to be a writer, and not just that, but a human being. Sometimes we get stuck, and often there is a reason. In your case it seems a pot of the past was getting all stirred up by all of those things from your mom’s house, and it was interrupting your flow, but really, the truth may be, it was helping you. All those memories, all that going back and forth, and even some chamber pot sadness (one is enough, I think, ha!) may help to heat up that story that is clearly rising inside you.
I can’t wait to read it when it’s done.
So glad to know you!
Dana, thanks for your continued support – and validating that I am not alone (even when I feel it ). The funny thing is that stirring up all these memories reminded me of why I started writing: to share the human emotions from my gut (good and bad) in a story with the world. And it guided me back to the kind of story I want to write. And I can’t wait to share with you!
p.s. I love love love gifs, Dana! You should see all the funny ones in my school presentation 🙂
Yes. All of it.
Dang, yes!