Demons

Are all writers tortured folks?
I have such a great (most of the time) measure of peace in my life. On a scale of 1 to 10, my optimism runs about a 9 most of the time. I can go a year without a "down" day. I can go that long without crying (Kodak commercials and movies like "It's a Wonderful Life,"
as well as the sight of my kids in some joyous moment don't count!). But I definitely go to some dark places sometimes when I write. Thankfully, most of my demons are now philosophical. I am no longer wrestling with anything deep and dark that keeps me up in the middle of the night. Instead, I wrestle with concepts and philosophies.
I read somewhere that you shouldn't trust a man (or woman) who hasn't struggled for his faith. If faith/God, for instance, comes effortlessly, does it mean you haven't really had that dark night of the soul when the chips are down and you have to decide whether to fold or show your cards? My cobbled together faith took years of intense struggle to get to.
Are demons part of writing? Do you have to go to dark places in order to write about your characters going dark places? I know when I finished The Roofer two years ago, I didn't want to even MOVE for a week, let alone resume my usual life.
And now . . . I am getting ready to write a new book--not sold yet . . . not anything but an idea yet . . . and it's dark. It's darker than anything I've ever even attempted. So where will it take me? I'm not sure. I still have five books under contract, so this is different. This is a journey whose end I can't fathom yet. But hope to keep the demons at bay.

Hurricane Blues

It's taken me a while to update my blog because we were hard hit by Hurricane Wilma. I left town after three days of no power . . . no Internet, of course (such a techno-geek . . . I really missed email). Food running out. No gasoline for the car to be had. After two weeks away, I returned home to my town an utter mess, but in the grand scheme of things, with the "hurricane burnout" this country has suffered, we did okay.
In the midst of all the disaster, I didn't write. First of all, I had no power. Then, even after I evacuated to someplace with power, I was definitely so weary, I was lucky I could have a coherent thought in my head. I had no emotional energy to write. I tend to pour a bit of myself into my books and with nothing left over emotionally, there was nothing left to give.
So it feels good to finally be back online, back at my laptop, creating again. I am grateful for the simple things like ICE and water I don't have to boil anymore, and cool air conditioning, and food in the stores. And a return to my online world and the gift of communication--phone, blog, email, writer chat groups.
So . . . I'm B-A-A-A-A-C-K!!!!!!!