Typically, spring and fall are my most creative seasons. I'm thinking that it might be a response to the pace of change around me. You know, leaves doing their time-lapse photography thing? Hail and sun breaks and wind? All the schlepping to and fro: school, soccer games, various health-related appointments. Inspiration wakes me up at 2:00 AM. New ideas surface as though immaculately conceived. Thoughts fragment into glassy shards, sprinkle like so much fairy dust and then disappear.
But this fall, something different. Leaden weight is pulling me to earth like a 1960's sit-com dad. Ward Cleaver in my brain, talking me out of my seasonal onslaught of half-baked ideas:
"Now, Suzy, you really haven't thought through your impulse to write a (insert screenplay, graphic novel, essay on the roller coaster of perimenopause), have you?"
"No, Dad, I haven't. I suppose I should revise the novel I've been working on for twenty years instead."
"Atta girl. You know, inspiration only gets you so far. Perspiration and tenacity are what will get you ahead in life."
"Gee, Dad, you really know how to rain on my parade."
So, mug of tea in hand, frumpishly shuffling along in my slippers, I survey the bulk of notes and papers relating to my aging work-in-progress. The furnace moves another layer dust around. This is the glamorous life of a writer.
What half-baked ideas are you talking yourself out of?
