Finally Free on a Friday Night

This is the first night in months that I’ve had nothing to think about. The first draft of my novel is finished and tonight I am sitting alone at my kitchen table amazed at how barren it looks now that my character notes have been put away. My computer screensaver now holds a different picture instead of the one of me and my muse standing and smiling under a clear blue late summer sky. I knew when the draft was done I would have to say goodbye to her. In fact, I was already in mourning during the last two weeks of writing. Maybe it was the past memory of her or the current regret of her not being here with me that made me so sad. But the feeling was real and I had to find a way to look away from her face while still keeping her fresh in my mind. I was successful in my challenge but I still feel the heartache from reaching the finish line. Taking her photo off my screensaver was the final task of my writing but it felt like more. With one click of a mouse button, part of my life was ending. It was that part of me that still held out hope for her to come back to me. Now I knew it was no more and I even went to the point of pulling the actual clothes that I wore in that picture out of my closet and donating them to Goodwill. This may seem to be a drastic step but I needed all remnants of that moment in time out of my sight. Now currently devoid of those memories of that past, I sit away wondering how to create new ones.