What I Mean By 'Anything'

When I ran out of ideas, I just wrote anything until the plot started churning again on its own, which it reliably did.

I was just saying that the other day.  But what does it mean to write anything?  For some people, it means quoting the dictionary.  For me, it means pure self-indulgence.

I write detailed descriptions of clothes, places, daily life, backstories, and where-they-are-nows.  In other words, I write all the stuff you're supposed to elegantly suggest in your story without boring your readers to death with plotless exposition.  Fuck that.  Call these notes in prose form.

If I get stuck even for expository vignettes, I literally just write in my fantasies: the character is wearing a dress I've always wanted, or living in my dream house, or telling someone off with a razor wit.  If I'm hungry, she's eating whatever I'm craving.  If I'm tired, she takes a nap.

I really can't explain why it works, but inevitably these diversions make a problem more complicated, a character more layered, the stakes a little higher. As long as I keep writing, I can find my way back into the story.  I know even as I write this horseshit that I'll take it out, but it's still beautiful.  It's the string on which the sugar crystals grow into rock candy.