I've been stuck in the final lap for a while now.<\/p>\n
Yep, I'm writing the final, climactic chapter of my new contemporary romance. The problem is that I've been writing the final chapter for a couple of months. It should have been long finished.\u00a0 By now, I should have finished the new one, finshed\u00a0a pre-publication edit of A Sixth Sense Of Forever - <\/em>the sequel to\u00a0Faerie<\/a> <\/em>and Golden<\/a> -\u00a0<\/em>AND started on my next project.\u00a0 <\/em>Instead, I keep getting side-tracked on tangents, writing pages of text over one weekend and not getting back to it until the next weekend.\u00a0 Then, when I read it back over, I realize that it's all wrong - either wrong for the\u00a0mood, wrong for the characters, or wrong for the story.\u00a0 I hit delete and write the section over again.<\/p>\n I've been making myself write - at least on the weekends.\u00a0 I know I should write something every day.\u00a0 I used to do that.\u00a0 It used to be that I couldn't wait to get home and write.\u00a0 The words would be churning inside, just waiting to burst free. But these days, it's sometimes tough to write on the weekends.\u00a0 The problem\u00a0is that my muse has turned fickle.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n My muse used\u00a0perch on my shoulder whether I was writing or not, urging me to the keyboard even when I should be doing other things.\u00a0 These days, I have to sit down to write and plead for muse to show up.\u00a0 Sometimes I write for days without her appearing at all.\u00a0 I didn't realize the difference until this morning, when she appeared about the time I opened my keyboard.\u00a0<\/p>\n Of course, when I sat down to write\u00a0it used to be that I wasn't bothered about this bill or that bill.\u00a0 I never used to have\u00a0worries and reality intruding on\u00a0my happy endings.\u00a0 These times aren't those times.\u00a0 These days, I'm grateful to be able to find the time to write.\u00a0 If I can find time to write and my muse shows up too, well, that's a good day.\u00a0<\/p>\n I believe that times will get better.\u00a0 Until they do, writers, like everyone else, must\u00a0deal with reality first.\u00a0 But writers have\u00a0a special gift.\u00a0 We can create happy endings.\u00a0 In these tough times, people need to believe that it's still possible to find a special someone.\u00a0 It's important to believe that whatever separates you and that special someone from a happy ever after can be conquered.\u00a0\u00a0And it can.\u00a0<\/p>\n Writers have to believe in happy endings.\u00a0 We have to be able to show people that better times are ahead.\u00a0 If we can't do it, who can?\u00a0<\/p>\n Reality\u00a0is hard.\u00a0 Some days are harder than others.\u00a0 But the thing I work to remember is that\u00a0no matter how bad a day is, I can come home and write a better one.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I've been stuck in the final lap for a while now. Yep, I'm writing the final, climactic chapter of my new contemporary romance. The problem is that I've been writing the final chapter for a couple of months. It should have been long finished.\u00a0 By now, I should have finished the new one, finshed\u00a0a pre-publication ...continue reading \"In Uncertain Times, We Have to Work Harder For Happy Endings\"<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3,4,6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quackingalone.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quackingalone.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quackingalone.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quackingalone.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quackingalone.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=278"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/quackingalone.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":739,"href":"https:\/\/quackingalone.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278\/revisions\/739"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quackingalone.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=278"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quackingalone.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=278"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quackingalone.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=278"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}