Maybe it's finally coming back to me
Aug. 20th, 2006 09:05 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
wordinistaFor myself and nearly every creative person I know, stress does a job on the creative spirit. A little over a year ago, RL was hitting me from all sides with various problems and dilemmas, and while this year has had its share of drama (thank you, ToraMom), it's nothing like last year. This month happens to mark UT's first anniversary, and in the course of one month, I had written five chapters. It's now a year later, and I have ten chapters -- however, considering how many times I've revised and rewritten those chapters, I should have upwards of twenty-five or thirty. I went back and looked at those early drafts today, and my god, were they bad. (Update over on ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
original_niamh, by the way.)
Anyway, it seems to me that I'm slowly but surely getting back to a place where I can sit down and write for a few hours at a time, rather than sit and stare despondently at the screen, tapping out a few words here and there before standing up in exasperation and searching out laundry to fold. This weekend, I was working on a few things, and actually got annoyed when I was interrupted, something that hasn't happened in quite a while. I also poked around a bit with some fanwriting, which was fun instead of aggravating, and I really, really feel like I have it in me to finish OGAM, which, after three years, is a huge relief. I'm actually quite bad at leaving things unfinished, and while I realize that OGAM is only fanfiction, and holds absolutely no worth as far as my real writing is concerned, I cannot leave it unfinished. I can't do that to myself. I feel like if I'm able to finish THAT, then I can channel that energy into my original fiction and say, "Well, hell, if I could finish OGAM, I can finish damn near anything."
The only unfortunate thing that I can see is, well... my hand. Over the past year or so, I've been noticing a weird sort of ache in my index finger joint. Turns out it's arthritis. It runs in my family, and both my mother and grandmother got it in their hands first. I'm noticing that after a few hours of typing and trackball maneuvering, my right hand aches. I can't grip anything (seriously -- I tried to get myself a scoop of ice cream earlier, and... I couldn't. I had to get Tora to scoop it for me), and by the time I go to bed at night, the knuckles in my right hand hurt. Like I sprained every one of my fingers. I've been using therapeutic putty, which seems to help, but it's a bit of a pain, as I can't type with putty in my hand. So usually I just squish it whenever I'm not writing. Or, you know, during those moments when I'm not doing anything with my right hand. For a right-dominant person, that's easier said than done.
But, you know, I'm so damned grateful that the urge and desire to write is finally coming back to me. I wish it didn't hurt, yeah, but I'd rather take inspiration with a side of pain than a stubbornly blank canvas in my head.
original_niamh, by the way.)Anyway, it seems to me that I'm slowly but surely getting back to a place where I can sit down and write for a few hours at a time, rather than sit and stare despondently at the screen, tapping out a few words here and there before standing up in exasperation and searching out laundry to fold. This weekend, I was working on a few things, and actually got annoyed when I was interrupted, something that hasn't happened in quite a while. I also poked around a bit with some fanwriting, which was fun instead of aggravating, and I really, really feel like I have it in me to finish OGAM, which, after three years, is a huge relief. I'm actually quite bad at leaving things unfinished, and while I realize that OGAM is only fanfiction, and holds absolutely no worth as far as my real writing is concerned, I cannot leave it unfinished. I can't do that to myself. I feel like if I'm able to finish THAT, then I can channel that energy into my original fiction and say, "Well, hell, if I could finish OGAM, I can finish damn near anything."
The only unfortunate thing that I can see is, well... my hand. Over the past year or so, I've been noticing a weird sort of ache in my index finger joint. Turns out it's arthritis. It runs in my family, and both my mother and grandmother got it in their hands first. I'm noticing that after a few hours of typing and trackball maneuvering, my right hand aches. I can't grip anything (seriously -- I tried to get myself a scoop of ice cream earlier, and... I couldn't. I had to get Tora to scoop it for me), and by the time I go to bed at night, the knuckles in my right hand hurt. Like I sprained every one of my fingers. I've been using therapeutic putty, which seems to help, but it's a bit of a pain, as I can't type with putty in my hand. So usually I just squish it whenever I'm not writing. Or, you know, during those moments when I'm not doing anything with my right hand. For a right-dominant person, that's easier said than done.
But, you know, I'm so damned grateful that the urge and desire to write is finally coming back to me. I wish it didn't hurt, yeah, but I'd rather take inspiration with a side of pain than a stubbornly blank canvas in my head.
