Writing when you’re single

Oh, yes I did draw a black
Wonder Woman with cornrows...

I’ve had some funny hehe (entertaining) and funny haha (oh, how embarrassing) moments writing as a single woman. Even as a black single woman, which adds another layer to what you may experience when you’re drafting your novel at home in singlehood, trying to explain your story-babies to folks at work, and even “secretly” sharing risqué fantasy fiction from beneath a cute moniker for your favorite video game… 

So, I realized it might be helpful and really, amazingly goofy of me to share how the single-writing-female thing goes down, for any avid fiction readers who wonder how it does all come together when real life is in the way, or for any other lady writers out there looking for friendly reflection from a fellow Diana Prince by day, Wonderwoman writer by night type of gal.

This will be a three-part series, so hold on tight! (You’re holding on tight because it’s exciting. Omg, are you still not holding on tight? You just hurt my feelings...)

#1 How the hell do you write good romances when you’re not dating?

Oh my God, so how many times over the years have I plunked down on the sofa at the end of a frustrating day of trying to work, while at day-job and not focusing on some guy who was great/letting me down at the moment, and then tried to come up with something noble, sexy
and inspiring once I’m really at work on the night-job with a story inside of my laptop? I can tell you that some of the romances I enjoyed writing best, happened when I was almost completely dejected about some horrible thing a guy had done to me. Damsel: Once upon a time when I was Catholic happened while I was recovering from both a six-year relationship that hadn’t worked, and also a really scary affair that decided to happen immediately after. So then, of course it starts with a woman feeling totally empty and abandoned, tied to a stake and left with kindling piled under her feet. She’s not been burned up yet. Eve is alone there, forgotten about even in this moment. She’s singing silly songs to keep her spirits up, then cussing at annoying song birds, waiting “for someone to save her, or else have mercy and light the damned pyre!” And then, when the knight and shining armor does come to save her, Eve just can’t trust it…

“Could my body, possibly, become a symphony? 
One horrible state offsetting another?”

But then, the goofy romances she recounts for Knight Cymen Ruecross afterwards: an evil baron, a handsome aloof pirate, even a dragon… I think I indulged in making Eve’s love life worse and worse and worse than mine until it was just too horrendous not to laugh at it. I loved laughing at her, and at Cymen, the emotionally unavailable, sexually frustrated, religious, conservative beau who knew he had bigger problems in his spiritual life than heathen Eve, yet, he couldn’t put her back down. They each could have resolved one another, but so far, they don’t ever seem to…

I think, when you love writing, the thrill of it, even when you are upset, can compel you to turn lemons into lemonade more often than you would in real life, perhaps. Often, via smitten horse princesses, fangirl Valkyrie types, anthropomorphic housecats moving on an underground subway to find true love in the big cat city, steampunked married robots who solve mysteries and other wild ideas—I find I am able to indulge in what I know love truly is, have felt at least once in life, and know is worth fighting for… with my fingers tapping in almost aroused haste over a keyboard. 

Looking back, writing as a single woman is more freeing than whenever I was dating someone. I was less tempted to hold back from possibly offending my lover at the time with unthinkably brilliant fantasy male types that definitely weren’t him and creative, otherworldly sexual experiences we two definitely were not gonna ever have together.

As a rule, I’m not pressuring any man I’m with to love me like a were-stallion. Let’s just keep things practical, okay, hun?

• Part Two: Writing when you're broken hearted & writing on date night