AUTHOR'S NOTE: Writer's Block

Earlier today this comment appeared from Andy: "Just wondering how you're doing with this. I'm looking forward to more of this."

I received an email notification about it, I quickly broke from my reverie to read it.  The irony of the moment was that at that very moment I was in deep thought about a narrative issue I am struggling with.

No secret I've been slowed down considerably of late, but the current gap is even more than I could have imagined.  I had taken some time to work out some long-arc details that I needed to be considering in the current portion of the narrative, but that led to a troublesome place... I realized I had an immediate issue that needed to be solved.  Very immediate - like in the very next segment I have to write.

This is an issue as I am publishing linearly.  Normally when I'm writing a screenplay or something where I know I'm going to be coming back for a re-draft before any serious audience other than me reads it, I'll just put in some kind of place-holder.  As simple as "major complication occurs here" to as fleshed out as "Ray and Ernie find each other in the middle of the chaos and have an emotional confrontation about their trust issues, once resolved they are confronted by Pale who they nearly overcome, but he marches them at gunpoint back to the main room for the climax..."  That kind of temporary shortcut is of no use to me here, so I have to work out the kinks... even if I do have to come back and fix stuff later, it at least has to feel like it's complete when posted.

But right now, I am stuck.  Holy smoke am I stuck.  It is simply one detail, but it's pretty indispensible.  I have slowly worked out all the surrounding details, so once I figure out this last piece I'll be ready to go.  Meantime - just earlier this week - it dawned on me that I could be writing subsequent chapters that don't hinge on what is about to happen next.

The good news is that in all this pondering I have found new elements to enrich the narrative when I have the opportunity to include them.

Anyhow... I can't imagine it'll be much longer, but I can't really put a date on when this writer's block with break.

NOTE:  I am adding this note four days later (January 19th).  It is not a substantial change to the above, merely an update.  Not worth a separate post.
The piece fell into place.  I figured out what I needed to put together in order to move forward.  Frankly, I didn't expect it to come to me quite as soon as it did.  I could tell I was close, but I didn't think it was that close.
In the process something else happened.  In pondering I came up with a slightly altered timeline that I think is ultimately going to be more dramatically interesting without changing much of anything except order.  So now I am writing a completely different set of events (which I would have written eventually anyways) instead of what I was hung up on.
I've written the first of two sections.  I imagine I'll finish the second on the weekend.  I'm not going to post the first until the second is done, they are too inter-connected to risk posting before I am certain of how they relate to one another.
Once they are complete, then I will be on (finally) to the plot point that I was stuck on since before Christmas.