The Muse is a Lie

I was watching Tiny Desk Concerts last week, and I saw Taylor Swift's. Tay-Tay is also shaming me for my laziness. The Internet has made much of her putting out TWO albums since the start of the pandemic, while I have this decade-old unfinished manuscript that is creeping asymptotically toward finished. She said that sometimes music just comes to her with no effort, like the song "All Too Well" did in the middle of the night, and other times, the inspiration isn't there, "and that's where the craft comes in."

Johnny Rzeznik said that composing is 2% inspiration and 98% perspiration. You roll tape and keep noodling around until something good comes out.

Stephanie Pearl-McFee said that she sits down and doesn't get up until she has met her word count for the session.

My heroine Dorothy Parker said that "writing is the art of apply the butt to the chair." She is my spirit animal is so many ways, not least because she never managed to finish a novel.

Yes. The consensus is that you sit and you stare and you poke out words (or chords) until there is something there. 

My first book was too easy to write. :-(

Why Can't I Finish This Damn Book?

 NaNoWriMo reminded me that I started my vampire book in 2011. 

Holy shit. 2011? 

And why, nine years later, haven't I finished it?

Because I don't love it? Because I don't quite know how? Because there is no point?

I think about plots for stories a lot. Like a lot. I think of stories I would like to read, and following the brilliant advice of my friend James, I am not a unique and special snowflake, and if I want to read something, there must be other people who want to read that thing, too. So I should just get off my ass and write it, right?

I bought a new MacBook with the scissor action keyboard, so no more annoying double letters and accidental periods and capitalizations, and it's GOLD for fuck's sake, so I should just write, right?

Right.

June Cleaver Was Better Equipped for the Apocalypse Than You

Feminist economics have long been saying that the entire economy rests on the unpaid "non market" labor of (mostly) women. And here as we enter the apex of the apocalypse, I sit smugly suited to dealing with the situation.

You say your rotten crotchfruit are driving you insane now that you actually have to spend many hours a day with them? Well, I spent seven years 24/7/365 with one or two tiny humans. When life returns to normal and you sigh with relief as you drop the little monsters off at daycare, don't ever again use the phrase "working moms," as if that's harder than either being a stay-at-home mom or a daycare worker.

You tired of all that jarred pasta sauce and canned soup? Well, I made pot roast and set up dough for fresh, yeast-leavened rolls for dinner before I left for my essential "work." And all the flour you panic-bought when you hadn't made so much as a boxed cake mix in more than a decade? I could make a sourdough starter from scratch for all the fresh bread anyone could want.

You think you need a face mask to do your grocery shopping? I can reach into my fabric stash and sew up three for you—one to wear, one for a spare, and one to share—so that your dumb, useless ass doesn't waste actual PPE that medical professionals need.

You're lonely seeing only your own family? Well, I spent 16 years with just my kids and husband, and nine months of "a real job" has me feeling overdone and wishing I were back home like the rest of you complainers.

All that "women's work" that society has denigrated for decades—thank you Betty Fucking Friedan—is suddenly quite valuable. Remember that when this pandemic ends.

My Plague Diary - Day 1

Big Daddy of the State of New York sent us all to our rooms, starting tomorrow at 8:00PM, so that we don't catch a social disease.

Well. I had missed being home...