Page Paralysis

I hate February so much. It's the month after my birthday so I don't have that to look forward to for another year. I was single for over thirty years so Valentines Day was always depressing then and even though Tom and I have been together for many years now, it still isn't one of my favorite holidays. February is cold and gray. It has no redeeming qualities at all. (Yes, I'm pretty sure I have some form of Seasonal Affective Disorder. So apt that the acronym is SAD.)

This particularly snowy, gray February has been even more difficult than most. It's been over a month since I wrote a book review and even longer than that since I wrote something that wasn't a book review. It's not like I'm not home and available to write. But I just haven't.

I love starting projects, especially since the advent of web sites. What's a good domain name? Is it available? What colors or themes would work best? What tools should I use? Who is my audience? Is it just me? Friends and family members? More than that? Just the thought of this makes me giddy.

What I'm not good at is finishing projects. When the going gets tough, I retreat to our loveseat and play endless games on my iPad. It becomes hard to force myself to do more than the most basic of tasks. There's a reason I never finished my Ph.D. The dissertation just wasn't happening for me. I believed I was going to fail at it and therefore why even try?

Okay, deep breath... As I mentioned elsewhere on this website, I did do some actual writing on this book idea back in 2022. It was the heyday of NaNoWriMo and I decided to get it a go (starting another project... again). I figured out how many words I needed per day to make 50,000 in 30 days. I hit that number day one... day two... and so on until I hit a wall on day five. And then I stopped.

Just in writing this, I'm remembering how important streaks are to me. When I was in the water aerobics class at my college, it was all about seeing how long I could go without missing a session. When I got my first FitBit, if I hadn't hit my 10,000 steps yet, I would walk around indoors until I did. This habit/quirk has repeated itself many times over for me. The problem is that when the streak is broken for whatever reason, I just stop and seldom start a new streak.

Currently, I'm using the Finch app for self care. It gamifies daily activities like brushing your teeth or even just getting out of bed. I'm on day 294 of using Finch time. (See? I can restart a streak on occasion!) When I first starting doing Cozying Up, I added a daily weekday task of writing 1,000 a day. I rarely if ever did it and eventually I just deleted the task from Finch.

When we were doing our beer blog (really more of an informational web site), I got the Monday "This Week in Beer" post written and published every week for years. Why could I do that and not this? What was different? What can I do to make this like that?

Deep breath number two... I just pulled up what I wrote for NaNoWriMo... and it's better than I remember. One thing I've learned from reading and reviewing books is that my writing isn't too bad. Years of writing for media (especially commercials) taught me to be a concise writer. Years of academic writing taught me about form and function (and the value of research). And "Aunt" Agatha (Christie) taught me about character development. Maybe... I can do this. Maybe.

One of our family mottoes is "bit by bit" and that's how I need to tackle this. Instead of 1,000 words each week day, I'm going to shoot for 250 words. Anything over that is bonus. If I start consistently writing that much, I'll think about bumping up the number. But I need an achievable goal to start with. And I'll let my birb Bean in Finch help with that. (I do love getting an "attagirl!" even if it's from a cartoon bird.)

While the research that I've been doing on how to write a cozy mystery has been helpful, I also thinking it's been overwhelming. What works for others doesn't seem to be working for me. I need to figure out my style, my method of writing, especially for longer form pieces. Much like how I cook, I'll start with a recipe that has worked for others and then modify the method for me. I do have a review of a cozy mystery resource half written and I should probably see about finishing that review.

I'm also going to continue to read and review books, mainly cozy mysteries. I have one memoir that I've finished (not my usual book to review but it was light and fluffy when I needed it). I also have two that I haven't finished and probably won't. One of them was written in first person, present tense and that drove me nuts. I got through three chapters and noped out. The second one is trying so hard. The two main characters seem overly earnest and it seems like the author is sharing too much of the characters inner thoughts. I may try reading a bit more of this one to see if it continues.

Most of all, I'm going to give myself space (and grace). This is supposed to be my retirement project. It's for me to enjoy, not to drive me crazy or stress me out. From sitting down and writing this, I'm seeing that I need more structure in my days, but not too much. As the saying goes, moderation in everything. Some guide rails to help me along, not rein me in.