I've begun and discarded countless entries in the past few months, if by countless I mean more than three but less than ten (or, if you actually can't count, it's literally true). I haven't gone this long without updating in the five-plus-year history of lupschada.com, and I have nothing to say for myself. I mean, that's my excuse - I have nothing to say for myself. Perhaps the problem is my Livejournal account, where I exhaust the daily inanities that would once have fueled my musings here. Perhaps, in my old age, I am all mused out.

Perhaps I have put so much of myself into the writing I do for work that I have no excess cleverings to spare. Never let anyone tell you that getting paid to do what you love won't change the way you look at it. Unless you are independently wealthy or overflowing with credibility, the abandon with which you once threw around your talents will come to resemble the assembly line routine of all the other work you've ever done.

This is not true if you are Stephen King - if you are Stephen King, you can wake up in the morning and write a story about zombie blue birds in love. If you want, you can throw in the kind of sex scene an eleven-year-old girl will read, like you did in It, that will haunt the girl well into her 20s and offer her distasteful terminology unbidden at inopportune moments. For this, you will be paid generously and five million people will read it.

I'm not Stephen King, but it's okay. I'm very glad for the opportunities at work. I don't even mind how it's reframed by feelings about writing. It forces me to look elsewhere for creative outlets; I now own a butane torch for the burning of things (specifically silver clay, but I don't want to limit myself). But I can't update this site with jewelry, can I - it's not how text-based media works. So I will try harder.

I will.