We Wranglers do a lot of communicating outside this blog—each
week we share how things have been for each of us and what the week ahead might
bring. Sometimes, ideas for the blog come out, and that just happened recently
when someone, can’t remember which one of us, mentioned something they were
fearful of, which immediately got us all started on our own fears, which then
turned into, “hey, I think we’ve got a theme!” So this month, we’re all going
to talk about what makes us afraid, whether it’s in our writing or in other
areas of our life. Hope you’ll join in the conversation with us every Tuesday
and Friday—sometimes the best way to deal with a fear is to own it.
Right off, you all know by now that Husband and I sold our home
of 35 years in April and moved into Son’s basement guest suite while we look
for another. Frankly, I can’t imagine what it must be like to sell one home and
buy another at the same time. Both the selling and the house hunt have been
arduous for these two old seniors. We have our lake cottage and that has been a
saving grace as we do this search, but homes in our price range are not nearly
as nice as we were expecting them to be. I’m sure we’ll find one that we can
make our dream home, but man…this is discouraging and angst-making.
As far as writing fears go, I’ve discovered that I’m not one of those writers
who can crank out book after book after book, to the tune of five to ten books
a year. I have no idea how people do that and frankly, I question the quality
of books that are “cranked out.” But maybe I’m just trying to make myself feel
better about the struggle I’m having fulfilling my promise to Tule that I would
write four books in two years. The stories are there, ready to be told, but I’m
a writer who needs time to percolate, to cogitate… Plus, editor Nan cannot stop
going back over already-written material. Ack! I want to be a writer who just
writes a first draft, then goes back for editing and clean-up, but it’s simply
not my nature.
Which brings me to another fear (I promise I won’t list them
all, none of us have that much time and this isn’t therapy…well, not really.):
I worry that I’m aging out of romance writing. Although I love writing and
being a storyteller, I don’t have the drive it takes to push my work the way I
see some authors do it. Street teams, relentless promotion, Instagram graphics,
Tweets, FB author pages and fan groups, newsletters, etc. How do they do it
all? Plus, they tweet about TV shows they watch and movies they go see, stuff
they do with their families, sometimes even their full-time day job…I mean,
holy Toledo, when do they sleep? Heck, when do they even breathe? I know some
use assistants, whom they have to pay. I’m a midlist author—I can’t afford an
assistant. My writing budget is pretty small, so I have to weigh options very
carefully as I choose where to spend my advertising dollars. It’s all very overwhelming
to this seasoned writer.
Sometimes (like now when I’m on a tight writing deadline and
I have editing gigs in the wings) I wonder if just stopping the whole crazy
train would be best for me—continue with the editing gigs because I enjoy those
and they are a source of steady income, but stop writing novels. Then a couple
of those pesky people in my head clamor for their story to be told… How do I not tell them?
So tell me… what kind of fears do you live with every day? This
is a safe place… let’s talk.
Since we'll be talking about my fears on Friday, I won't disclose them here, but I can say I identify with your professional ones and sympathize with your moving ones. A great post, Nan!
ReplyDeleteGreat post, Nan! I think we all have those feelings from time to time. I don't have any great advice, but sometimes I think just sharing our fears is enough to help us start moving past them.
ReplyDeleteYes, I can identify with your professional fears, too. This is a tough business with so many things to master, apart from the writing itself. I think writing about and sharing our fears helps, like Kristi said. We're not alone.
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