Broken

I think my head is broken. I don't hear any bolts or shards of metal rattling around in there, but maybe that's just because it's mostly empty, or filled with those non-biodegradable packing peanuts.

I have not been writing. What's wrong with me? I love writing! I miss writing. I am close to the end of my novel, and the thought of finishing it makes me so happy. The thought of editing and revising it makes me happy, too! So why am I not working on it?

After NaNoWriMO ended, I did write a few times during the first couple of weeks of December. But then I got extra busy with Christmas stuff, and then the week of Christmas I was in a retirement home in GA, away from a computer. When I got home I was busy with miscellaneous stuff like going to a funeral, and I was also just really tired and a bit stressy. But now I am back into just regular old life, and I still haven't written.

Part of my problem is that my work schedule varies so much. I would love to get into a daily routine and do the same thing every day, I think that would make things a lot easier for me. I could set a time and write at the same time every day, and get into a habit. But I leave home anywhere from 7:30am to noon, and get back home anywhere from 5:30 to 10:00pm. I really hate that about my job, actually.

The horrible thing is, I really want to write and I know it would make me happy to write. I finally figured out what bliss it is for me, but am I doing it? Nooo. And here's what my stupid head is doing to me: for the past couple of weeks I've been having nightmares, just about every night. Mostly public restroom nightmares, of course, because that's almost exclusively what my bad dreams dream are about. I've had dreams of dark, shadowy cavernous restrooms with no actual toilets to be found anywhere, huge mazelike abandoned factories, people vomiting, having to make my way down unsteady metal stairs rotted away with rust, accidentally walking through foot-deep sewage. Ugh. Shut up, head, I already know I should be writing! My head is just being MEAN.

Here's the extra stupid part. I look forward to writing, when I'm in the car on my long commute, when I'm at work, when I'm in the grocery store,  I can't wait to get home and get some writing done, and hang out with my characters.  I can't wait to see how the things I have planned for them actually end up happening. But then when I'm at home, somehow, it doesn't occur to me. It's not that I keep putting it off to finish the laundry or watch a movie or whatever, it actually doesn't even come to mind, I just completely forget. Until it's too late, like when I'm on my way to work again, or when I wake up at 4am after a bad dream. Seriously, my head is broken!

However, for the next three weeks I actually do have the same schedule (that never happens), so I am determined to start a pattern. TODAY. I had a pattern going during November. I guess I should say I want to start a nice, happy write-y pattern, not a bad stupid nightmare pattern, which is what I've got going now.