Writing Feels So Good

(Well aware that we're an apostrophe short in that tweet,
but I maintain that it's just invisible.)

It almost feels like a guilty pleasure. Like I've stuffed my face with an entire Milka-bar of chocolate after two months of die-harding without it and still not getting rid of these stupid spots. But it isn't that. I've been writing.

The last few months I've been extremely busy, which in my view is the only reason I'm allowed to use for not writing. I have one translation deadline after another and in order to get it all done, something's gotta give. Which is why writing a novel is the first thing to go - translation pays the bills.

Because the thing about writing is that I'd rather not start in something that I know will need to be an entire novel length type of story than knowing that I can only manage to write for about an hour or two one night and have no time to return to it for about a month . I believe in a certain flow, and I'd rather not staunch that once I get started. I don't want my ideas to crowd my brain when I should be translating and thus writing an entirely different story, while my own gets forced into the backseat where it needs to stop whining and wait till I have more time on my hands.

This weekend I finally managed it. I took an idea that I'd shelved a few months ago and kneaded it into a short story of approximately 12,000 words. The reason is that I saw a competition come by on Facebook and I just wanted to give it a go. Also, I've just finished my recent translation of Mystic (by Alyson Noël), and am allowed to give myself a weekend off to prepare for my new translation. Also, this was the weekend in which we celebrated my mother's birthday and had a family get together on my husband's side of the family, so I figured I wouldn't get much translating done anyway.

Once again I'm absolutely proud of myself for writing the story. I've been keeping track, it's cost me a total of nine hours over three days, so far. Not bad, huh? One or two more edits or at the very least re-reads and I'll send it in. I'm not sure that I have a winner on my hands, but I need to write to keep that part of my brain happy and well-oiled, it seems. And it turns out that I feel much better as a result of unplugging that cork for a few days. At least one of the story ideas got out and got turned into an actual story, no matter what becomes of it.