I was joking with my younger daughter about coming up with a ceremony to summons my muse, which apparently has been on vacation for the last few months.

We decided that it would consist of lighting a special candle and louching a glass of absinthe. Then there would be some sort of incantation, which I have yet to devise. Something like:

Oh missing muse
Where did you go?
I need to write
Let inspiration flow!

I have several projects started, but every one of them ground to a halt sometime around September. I’m not sure you can call it writer’s block. It’s just more of a case of the batteries in my creativity generator wore out and I have yet to replace them. It was like the creativity began lurching, and then sputtering, and then made this sound:

BBBBRRRRRRRBBBLLLLLRRRppppppth … POP!

And then the check engine light went on.

Of course I then immediately got a robocall, saying, “Your creativity’s extended warranty has run out…” and then they wanted me to send $500 in Target gift cards to reinstate it.

The main projects I have going, which are currently going nowhere, are a sequel to No Such Thing as Mermaids, but this one is about gnomes. What I have of it — about 4 chapters — has gone dark. As in, the story went down a dark path I didn’t really want to follow.

The other story, which I’ve started, tore up, and started over again several times, is about a knight coming over from a parallel dimension — one where Earth had been hit by a comet and plunged it into an ice age. To him, coming here, is to come over to the Realm of Chaos. He doesn’t understand why people grow lawns instead of food, or why we spend a great deal of money on devices to save us from exerting effort but then pay more money to go to a “gym” to exert effort. I imagine this story as a comedy along the lines of Douglas Adams, but it, too, keeps going down dark paths.

Because of this current tendency of my writing to go to dark places, I decided to try and purge myself of it by writing something REALLY dark. It’s a movie script, and it’s so dark it freaks me out, and I’m only about 1/3 the way into it. Oddly, that one keeps wanting to swerve into comedy.

That’s where I stand at the end of 2021. I’m currently away on a trip as I write this, but when I return home I plan on summonsing my muse and forcing my creativity engine back into high gear. I’m going to finish at least one of these projects in 2022.

Until then, I hope this finds you well. Stay safe out there, my friends. Here’s wishing you a wonderful and much brighter new year.

Jerry J. Davis
Rochester MN
December 28, 2021