I had a daily fiction-writing streak going since early March, and yesterday I broke the streak. Didn’t write any words for my fiction.
I got up late, still needed to make lunches for me and the kids, and due to an emergency sinkhole repair on the main road I usually take to work, I needed to leave early. So when I sat down to write, I barely managed to get a few words into my writer’s notebook before I had to jump in the shower.
Today was almost a repeat of yesterday, but I made it to the writing desk a little bit earlier and managed to eek out one sentence. Nineteen glorious words. But they were enough. A new streak begins.
What’s amazing about those nineteen words is that as soon as I’d written them, I felt myself lighten. Suddenly the early morning sun seemed brighter. I felt this buoyancy and energy surge through me. Just because of nineteen measly words. One sentence. But it was enough. Even something as small as a sentence can give me that spark. This is why I write fiction. Whenever I do–the good days, the bad days, the days when the words flow, and the days when the words seem caked in dry mud–I feel better. There’s something about putting words to paper–storytelling words, words that make up new worlds and characters–that fills me up, that makes me feel whole. Even one sentence, one small set of nineteen words, can do it.
I may not be writing thousands of words each day like I was in the summer, but even a small smattering of words, written daily, keeping (or starting) a streak, can make a difference. Small words every day, 365ish days a year, adds up. But even beyond the growing word count, it’s the act of writing that gives me joy. One sentence, a few words. That’s all it takes.
