Lest you think I've completely disappeared or given up...I remain alive and mostly well.
I don't know much about writer's block. My blocks are so many, it's hard to say what's what. But if by "block" we mean a total disinterest in writing anything or even opening the manuscript files, well then I think we can safely call it. This is already the most writing I think I've done in months.
Usually, things turn around. They always have, in any case. But this is the longest I've gone. This is the most completely I've lost interest. So that's new. But we can't say for sure what's happening until it is done happening. I can't imagine having done all this work and spent all this money and then not seeing it through, but....something something sunk cost fallacy. I'm not required to keep going just because I did all that.
I don't want it to have been for nothing though - neither the work itself or the period of my life it covers. Seems like literally the least I can do for 25 years of frustration and anxiety is eulogize it. I tell myself it will be better for this break, this distance. I might even be right.
Part of the problem is the enormity of the task. It's just so unwieldy, how does one even approach something like this after so long away? My current plan is to start from scratch, as it were, and just pull the best of the essays into a small pile, and then grow that pile. I just threw everything in, and I fear that there's an unevenness in quality and clarity. I don't want to publish something I don't fully love and support. Just because I wrote it down doesn't mean it deserves light.
But the idea of launching this out to the world...in my imaginings, it's either pulled apart and vilified or else it languishes in obscurity. Neither scenario can be said to be motivating. But I know neither is likely to happen. I know. But the theme is a lack of confidence and faith in my abilities. Not a surprise, exactly, as that's pretty much what I'm writing about. What a blow to lay all those fears out and find out I was right.
I don't really think that. Not really. Not all the time, anyway.
More soon, I dearly hope.