Muddling Through...

    My first book in two and a half years just came out. The comments back from my friend's and my mama are great. But they're reading it too fast. Because it's not like sister has another one coming out tomorrow! In fact, it won't come out until this time next year. I'm almost 60,000 words in, but oh my this one has been a challenge.
   I've never been an outliner. I'm a write as you go kind of girl. Hope the inspiration shows up in the morning and let's see where this story is going to take us. I always know the beginning, pretty much know the ending, but have no idea what is going to happen as we go. I like my characters. Really I do. The  theme is pretty heavy, so I'm having to find ways to lighten it up. But it's the muddling...I just feel like I'm muddling.
   Each morning, I have me some quiet time, fix my usual breakfast of toast with some peanut butter and homemade preserves, grab me a coke and a chair outside, until the humidity forces me indoors and I open up my Word document and stare at the page. Where do we go next? Is my question each morning.
   Thankfully each morning something shows up. I've always told people who want to write they simply have to start. And so that is what I am doing every morning, starting. Though each morning I'm just as scared as I was the day before. I remember after my divorce three years ago I didn't know if I'd ever have another story to write. I sat down at the computer and stared at the blank screen and just prayed that something would come up. I remember that sweet whisper in my heart from my heavenly father..."if you show up I'll show up." And He did. Otherwise "Hurricanes in Paradise" would have never been written.
   I feel like I'm not doing much more than showing up these days. Of course part of it could be the mental drainage that has recently occurred from my new marriage and now current "bonus mom" to five beautiful children, when I have never had children of my own. But whatever the reason, all I know is one day, just like I have so many other days in the past, I'll hold a finished piece of work in my hands and wonder how that ever happened. Muddling through ain't always a bad thing. Because remember, at least you're getting through...

Denise Hildreth Jones just released her sixth southern fiction novel to the applause of reviewers and readers alike. She makes her home in Nashville, Tennesse with her husband, five "bonus children", two shih-tzu's and an endless supply of Coca-Cola. And every now and then she gets to read a book herself.
www.denisehildreth.com
www.denisehildreth.typepad.com "Flying Solo" A blog for singles