It’s different, just different now. The words, they don’t flow as they used to. In stories, at least. Used to be that I could sit down and write for a day or two and a tale would be told, but not now.
Laboriously, the words appear a paragraph at a time—sometimes not even complete. Leave it, read it again, and leave it behind some more. Days go by, a conversation is started; it’s written down as I’ve heard it inside. Then going back over from title to where I left off, tweaking and twiddling and polishing words. Dropping and cutting and pasting them elsewhere. Some never form black printed letters again.
Slowly, so slowly I lose train of thought, a story develops in serial form. Unfired by my passion, unrushed by my need, someone appears but I know them quite well. Maybe I am just listening harder, maybe more critical, maybe just jaded a bit by real life.
The Lost Children: A Charity Anthology