Writing hibernation

I haven’t left my house in days, lovely spring weather be damned.

I’ve actually missed being sequestered in my bedroom, writing thousands upon thousands of words. Yesterday, after writing sixteen pages of my thesis, I remembered back to when the actual writing was difficult for me, when an 8 page paper seemed totally undoable with two weeks to plan for it. I think the stuff around writing will always be tough for me – I really do need to check my emails, bloglines, Flickr stream, Myspace page, weather in several cities, etc ten thousand times before I start to write. I can do that for days actually. But nothing beats that feeling of actually getting down to it and settling in with my thoughts and the clacking of the keyboard, feeling that peace, feeling my synapses firing away.

All these tiny and not so tiny efforts are coming together, I’m seeing my future happen and it’s damn cool. In a month, I’ll be 27 and my masters’ thesis will be done, graded, and on file with my department. On May 15th I’ll do the department graduation – incidentally, that is the same day my book ships from the printer. And then that pile of writing that I did much of the same way I’m writing now, in bed (mine or my boyfriend’s) and pajama-clad, will be out in the world. Then the true insanity begins, and I’ll be traveling, speaking, doing interviews and hopefully having the time of my life, watching it unfold but also treasuring it.

I savor these moments, quiet writing in my room, knowing that these days will become harder and harder to come by, but I need to tell people to fuck off when I need to, because I really can’t do without these days. Though I thought perhaps it would do the opposite, those months of book-writing make me need to do this, words on the screen, ideas getting worked out, days not answering the phone or responding to emails. I can’t wait to write more, publish more, talk about all this stuff more. I’ve got that bug bad, I just have to figure out what best to do with it, though I suspect I don’t have to figure too hard anymore, I just have to leap forward and have a little bit of faith. The hard work part of it is a given.