Reconciling Saints

First... I need a picture. You know, something for inspiration.

Hold on.

Also, I need a new computer... or maybe a typewriter (see above). Half the keys don't work on this one and now it's running QUITE slowly. I also have to annoyingly SMASH the spacebar in order to get any spaces between the words. 

However, that's beside the point.

I've been working on the book... or whatever... since NaNoWriMo in November. I'm trying to get it just right, but something is just not coming together. Part of it has to do with rewriting it to find the right voice. With a narrator, it seems too distant, too boring, but when I try to tell it through Clara, it feels a bit forced because, well, I'm not used to thinking like an 8-12 year old.

It's been slow going, to say the least.

So here I am, trying to find a voice and a way to pull the story together, shape it up a little bit.

Sometimes, though, sometimes it just seems EXCEPTIONORDINARILY hard. That's a word I learned from the Clarice Bean books. I highly recommend them for some light reading.

Sunday night I went a bit bonkers... well, a bit more than usual... and I felt like it was all for nothing, a story that wasn't a story... and not very good, at that. I felt like a phony, a charlatan, and I convinced myself that there was nothing for me in writing.

Still, somehow I can't give up. I wish someone would just tell me I'm horrible at it and I should take up something more useful... like stamp collecting, say.

Until then, I'm afraid I'm going to stay in this emotionally abusive relationship between me and my writing.

Jane, get me off of this crazy thing called... writing.