Yes, it’s happening again. I’ve managed to work on the manuscript a little bit each day for the past several. At last, I wake up already immersed in the story. For me, that’s different from merely thinking about the story.
Gaps between writing days produces the condition where I only think about my characters, setting, plot, rather than staying with them. Add a few two and three-day gaps and all that’s available to me are memories of the story. That’s not a good place to be.
Thanks to the continuity I’ve gone back to keeping paper and pen on the nightstand so as to capture even the essence of an idea, with hope of actually falling back to sleep. This is a solid head start when I boot up the computer ready to work the next morning.
In short, I’ve relearned one of the most important lessons in writing, and that is—write; keep writing and do it every day. Both the word count and quality continue rising.