On drawing back to germinate

I started an indefinite social media shutdown last night, which means absenting myself from Facebook, Twitter and Instagram (my primary SM outlets). I haven't set a time limit on this, although I'm sure I will be back on for my youngest child's birthday near the end of the month, if for no other reason than that my extended family will get shirty if I don't post birthday piccies on our main shared communication network (FB). I think it might not be much before that, though.

I don't count this blog as SM, even though I suppose it could be seen that way; I tend to write here intentionally and at spaced intervals, rather than constantly / episodically, and I don't find it a distraction in terms of constant checking and responding the way I do "true" SM. The blog is much more of a writing tool for me than an interactive / communication tool.

Using all my writing tools is in keeping with my primary reason for pulling back from SM at this time. I am in a welcome phase of burgeoning ideas and creative output in my writing life, and to nurture this and make the most of it, I need the headspace and the lack of distraction that divorcing myself from the ever-moving river of SM affords.

I am very busy with work and family life, and the time and energy I do have available, I want to channel into poetry, revising my NaNo manuscript (Theory of Mind) from last year, and going back to two previous novel "starts" that I've had sitting around since 2011 and 2013 respectively, but am newly inspired to see what could be made of them. (They are tentatively called, respectively, All the Fur and Fin - which has 20,000 words on it - and The Ark At The End of the World, which is sitting around 18,000 words. All the Fur and Fin is a fairly straight narrative, possibly but not certainly YA, while The Ark is science fiction / dysytopian.)

So if I am here in the coming month, it will be with my writer's hat on - trying out poems, teasing through tricky plot points, maybe test-driving some characters or situations. I find that a useful thing to do, for me, and hopefully it's of at least some interest to a few others.