Thursday 22 December 2011

It's been a while...

I've been doing things and not blogging about them for quite a long time now. It's been a busy year but I haven't written the blog because writing it was becoming a chore and something to be guilty about, and there are so many other things I could do voluntarily that would make me happy rather than guilty, so I did those instead. Simples!

But while doing NaNoWriMo this year I realised something very valuable about this blog; It forced me to write regularly. And that act of writing regularly, turning over my accumulated impressions of the world around me and filtering the rubbish from the stuff that could make good compost, gave me a wonderfully rich and fertile ground for my imagination. This year during Nano, I ran out of inspiration. I could not get excited about the very few ideas I had because I had no others to link them to.

I had neglected my garden, I didn't turn or contribute any nutrients to the ground and weeds grew and strangled it. I was only hit by inspiration at the very last minute, and that wasn't particularly original inspiration. A new take on another's tale in fact.

For as long as I've been doing Nano, I've been doing this blog. I didn't realise the two went hand in glove. Of course, I could have written my own stream of consciousness in a diary or some such, but that doesn't force me to edit as I go along, and it somehow is not so sharp a stick for producing regular work.

I did a lot relating to writing this year, I've been particularly studious in fact, but I concentrated all my efforts on revision rather than on creating any new content, and I feel the lack most direfully.

So, I am going to try here on in to be a more faithful correspondent. It's for my own good after all.

Hello again world!

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