As I write this post, I’ve just finished the holiday story for July 12. I enjoyed writing it — one of the characters in it is my long-distance partner, or at least the fictionalized version of her — and it’s based on the first foursome I ever wrote. It’s just over 2800 words long.

It’s also the first piece of fiction I’d written in several days.

The holiday stories project is a lot of work — 365 stories, 100 to 5000 words in length apiece, more than 75 characters so far to keep track of so far (thank goodness I have a spreadsheet). And, just like with every other long project I’ve worked on, I’m starting to run out of steam.

When I wrote my first genre fiction novel, I got through about twenty chapters, and then petered out, only finishing it because of a self-imposed deadline. When I wrote Lessons, it took me ten years to get past chapter ten. Training the Trainer had a huge gap in the middle of it (the writing process, not the actual book). The third “Plans” book is about a quarter done and is currently on the shelf while I work on the holiday stories. My latest YA novel (unpublished so far) took months. And I have three genre fiction novels that I’m in various stages of writing — one is up to chapter ten with about twenty chapters to go, one is up to chapter two with eight chapters to go, and one is up to chapter thirty-five with about twenty chapters to go. I haven’t worked on any of those in over a year.

What do all of these things have in common?

I worked on them feverishly for a while, and then less, and then less, and then less, and finally I gave up.

I don’t plan to give up on the holiday stories. But it seems like every morning when I open my spreadsheet and check the next holiday I have to write about, I just seem to care less and less about doing the work. Maybe it’s because I know how — generally — the main story arcs are going to end. Maybe it’s because I’m tired of writing so much erotica (though, as my friend Shon Richards says, the porn must be written). Maybe it’s because there are only so many ways to write a spanking scene and I’ve done just about all of the ones I’m interested in doing. I honestly don’t know.

But I need an injection of fresh steam. And soon.