Setting aside time to imagine…

Is just as important as writing.

Right now, I need to take some time to brainstorm and daydream about the final chapters of Red Hour. I’m so close but not getting over that finish line. I wrote the ending a year ago, but there is a gap before those final scenes. I need to fill it but am not sure exactly how I want to do that.

Part of my trouble with having good daydreaming time is the cicada invasion. I mostly listen to audiobooks while I walk my pup, but sometimes I use that time to breathe fresh air and think about my books. Lately, that has not been an option. The cicadas are everywhere and so loud.

My dog, Murphy, thinks catching and eating them is a fantastic game. Yuck. A combination of shells, dead insects, and live cicadas litter most of the sidewalks around here, so I am focused on watching my step. Murphy is no longer allowed to sniff and do his business on most of the trees we walk by because they are literally covered in the things. Even some of the street lamps and road sign posts aren’t safe for him to sniff because the dumb cicadas think it’s a tree and have climbed up. Sorry, pup, here is a stretch of grass with very few bugs, please use it. I am on high alert the entire time we are walking, brushing off the half dozen that land on me, watching the pup dive at them, and sometimes having to remove them from his schnauzer beard after he spit them out and they clung to him. Ugh.

Can anyone explain the important role they play in the food chain so I don’t want to destroy them all?

After a few more weeks these bugs will be gone, but I don’t want to wait that long to dream up the rest of this book. I really want to finish Red Hour. So, I might have to sit on the deck with a cup of coffee and just stare at the clouds while the cicada song acts as white noise. Wish me luck.

If you have other good brainstorming practices, drop a comment.