Since last checking in, the world seems a little bit less on fire, but not significantly so. Throughout the whole lockdown, I saw a lot of authors and fellow writing buddies posting on social media about how they didn’t feel like writing AT. ALL, and dude, I totally get that. Trust me, I do. And even though we all have a whole laundry list of valid reasons for not being able to be creative and productive, that didn’t save us from the shame spirals.
People have also been talking about “the new normal” and what that’s going to look like. Considering how much is still up in the air, I think the answer is pretty much: ¯_(ツ)_/¯. But even though a lot of things still suck right now, and I wouldn’t say life is much less stressful than it was a month ago, maybe some of us are starting to adjust to the world in its current state.
I am still playing the hell out of Fire Emblem: Three Houses, and it continues to be both the escape I need and just a plain ol’ GOOD piece of fiction on its own. After poking around the fandom a bit, I started writing some fanfic. Then I wrote some more. For a while there, I was in a pretty good writing routine, for once. Which then led me to think…is it time to start applying this creative burst to my own original projects?
The answer: still ¯_(ツ)_/¯. And then that leads into the next obvious question, what should I write? I haven’t touched Sonata for Springtime since last September or so, and I already have the first third done, so that was a possibility. I’ve had a dystopian romance mentally plotted out for a couple years, and I’d planned on that being my next project following Hunting Astrid, but I think it’s understandable that I am NOT in the mood for dystopia right now. And there’s another old project/idea I thought about revisiting, which I’ll eventually dedicate a blog post to, but I’m not 100% sold on it yet.
So, I thought about what’s been making me so happy about and motivated to write FE3H fanfic. Although Hunting Astrid is in a totally different setting, I realized there were some similarities that made me excited about writing: fast-paced, plenty of action, and, above all, FUN. At this point, I definitely need my writing to be FUN right now. Sure, it can be fun to write darker stories, with all sorts of Very Important Feelings, and I still plan on doing that sometime in the future, but FUN is taking priority at the moment.
I could go on for another several paragraphs about the age-old “where do ideas come from?” but two days ago, I came up with the most basic of plots in the most basic of settings with three basic characters, and since then, I’ve been fleshing those out. I’m in no rush to start, especially since my free time is being devoted to a crocheted baby blanket that has a very firm deadline that is fast approaching, but the details are gradually surfacing, so I think I’ll be good to go soon enough. I’ve blogged before about how I have a tendency to not write a whole lot during the summer months, but this is a new world, so who knows what will happen. But I have a plan, and plans are good. Plus, even if the writing goes slowly, I know I’m not alone.