Creative Brush Fire

I am delighted and surprised to already be 20,000 words into my novel. Many cups of hot green tea and hot chocolate, many offerings of encouragement from friends, and some helpful feedback on what I have created so far have been a welcome part of the literary journey.

It is a long birthing process, this endeavor to express in black and white the story that has been incubating in my mind since last summer. My sensations are a far cry from the morning sickness or shifting of organs or general invasion of the body experienced by mothers-to-be...but each week the characters grow a little more, the story becomes a little more detailed and layered, the perception of creative momentum is amplified.

I wonder what this work of art will be when it is fully released, when it assumes its final form. I wonder what stories I will have to tell beyond it, as it seems I am leaving so much of my soul etched within its pages.

This is God's greatest work in people, to engage in vocation that brings music to the heart and sets forth a creative brush fire than can only be suffocated by yielding to discouragement. I will continue to offer words until the last flicker of flame licks with exhaustion, until the final curls of smoke float up from the ashes and inherit the wind. It is what I was made to do.