Why I'm not writing tonight
Jan. 22nd, 2005 08:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
truepennyShort stories are like an itch.
Novels, they're just there. It's what I do. If I'm not doing something else like eating or sleeping or running errands, I'm either writing a novel or I'm procrastinating on a novel. It's my default setting.
But short stories ... It's an intermittent, deep-seated, and frequently unscratchable itch. And it doesn't necessarily have a thing in the world to do with having ideas for short stories. It's just this urge. Something short, pithy, and with claws, please.
But getting from there to a local habitation and a name is ... I need my backbrain to give me something: a bone, a scrap of lace, anything.
And it just sits there and says, Short story please! and gives me the wide-eyed unhelpful stare of a cat who knows you ought to know what it wants, and it's your fault you don't.
Novels, they're just there. It's what I do. If I'm not doing something else like eating or sleeping or running errands, I'm either writing a novel or I'm procrastinating on a novel. It's my default setting.
But short stories ... It's an intermittent, deep-seated, and frequently unscratchable itch. And it doesn't necessarily have a thing in the world to do with having ideas for short stories. It's just this urge. Something short, pithy, and with claws, please.
But getting from there to a local habitation and a name is ... I need my backbrain to give me something: a bone, a scrap of lace, anything.
And it just sits there and says, Short story please! and gives me the wide-eyed unhelpful stare of a cat who knows you ought to know what it wants, and it's your fault you don't.
