I’ve been working on a book series for five years. By working on, I mean “thinking about.” I’ve never felt any motivation to type any of it. It was mostly formless in my mind. I had a concept. A question. I teach AP Seminar and Research, so it was like what my students have to start with. I’ve seen issues in the world, and I had a big “What if…”

Every night as I fell asleep I would visualize and fantasize a world that answered my big question. I looked forward to it because it’s delightful to think about. Yet it never progressed into anything. The way I think about problems, I mostly came up with obstacles and more questions instead of answers. And I certainly didn’t come up with plot. Or characters. The hobgoblin of fiction would whisper, “But what about… And that won’t work because… And what if…”

Then last year, my coworker finished and self-published the novel he’s been talking about writing for ten years. Was I happy for him?

Hell, no.

I was envious. Resentful. I’m a petty bitch.

I once asked him how he found time to write, being a full-time teacher and a parent of many children.

“Honestly? My wife.”

No shit. But I don’t have a wife. As Judy Brady Syfers famously asked in Ms. Magazine in 1972, “Who wouldn’t want a wife?” See also my post about my fantasy personal assistant. What couldn’t we do if we all had a Trad Wife? It’s the equivalent of a celebrity’s personal assistant except you don’t have to pay her. Of course he could write a novel. He didn’t have to cook, clean, do the taxes, take the kids to and from school or parties or playdates or orthodontist and doctor appointments. He didn’t have to take the car in to be serviced. He didn’t have to regulate the emotions of a husband and two teen daughters.

And then I started psychoanalysis with a highly-trained and talented practitioner. After about a year, I had to admit the problem wasn’t not having a “wife,” the problem is me. I don’t like to work hard. I’m lazy. It’s okay that I’m lazy-a lot of people are lazy. It doesn’t make me a bad person. It makes me a person who doesn’t have a novel written.

A few months ago I was watching a You Tube video after work and I took out one of the long, skinny notebooks with a rigid backing that my journalism students use for reporting. They’re easy to hold and write on while you’re standing up with no surface to write on. They’re designed for it. I grabbed my favorite pen (Pilot Dr. Grip Gel, if you’re curious) and wrote some thoughts and insights in cursive.

I love writing in cursive. I rarely have the chance. My students can’t read it, so I have to mark their essays in careful, time-consuming printing. My cursive is elegant, neat, and beautiful. I can write almost as quickly as I think the words. When I started putting thoughts down about my novel series, I was under a spell.

A magic cursive spell! The Muse was in my pen. I must have covered 20 of those long skinny pages with notes, questions, details, information from the YouTube videos I was watching for research. And you know what? I didn’t stop. It happened the next day. And the next. And it’s happened ever since. I’m writing every day and loving it. I’m building an entire world from scratch and solving logistical problems that used to nag me and kill my inspiration. Plot ideas have emerged. Characters are slow to come because that’s a weakness of mine. It requires an introspection I like to avoid. A vulnerability to inhabit a person I made myself. And then I have to put that person through Hell. Creating characters hurts me. I’m excited though, because about a week ago, I started hearing their voices and their opinions and they’re starting to creep into my notes.

My wise sister suggested that the creative part of my brain is connected to my hand and to my cursive writing. Do you ever hear someone say something like that, just an off-hand observation and it hits so hard you stop in your proverbial tracks? That was this comment for me. Yes! My story was locked up behind my distaste for typing. It was stuck in the ether and in my imagination, and my hand holding a pen is the conduit. Cursive is the grease that makes the ideas flow.

Is it convenient that all of the dozens of pages of ideas are written out in cursive? Nope. But it’s hardly insurmountable. Besides, I haven’t started writing any plot yet. I’m planning. I’m world-building. And, Constant Reader, it is SO satisfying. I’m in love with doing it.

I hope some of you will come along on the journey with me. At some point I will publish. I don’t know in what format. Sometimes I think a serialization where I put out chapters at a time. Other times, I just have no idea, but I know I’ll figure it out because I want to. I’m aching to. I’m hungry to!

I used to give up on writing before I ever started. Old voices from my childhood teased me that I’d never get published, that I’d never make any money, that EVERYONE wants to be a writer and what makes YOU so special? Even hard-working talented people never “make it.” But my intention and my desire is to write and to be read. That’s it. I just want to be read. And I believe that will happen, so I’m going to write my book series.

If you’re curious about Judy Brady Syfers piece from 1972, it’s amazing. https://www.thecut.com/2017/11/i-want-a-wife-by-judy-brady-syfers-new-york-mag-1971.html

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