You have be in love with something to write. Even if you are only in love with writing, that will work. If you have a wife you love, and animals you love, that changes the quality of the writing, and I don’t mean it edges you into sappy sentimentalism or anything like that – I mean it can give you a certain freedom.
I’m lucky to be in love with an artist who can write, and even if she wasn’t, is the kind of person that is so able to make others feel able, that being with her is the best thing that has ever happened to me.
You need to find it somewhere. Jeez, even if you love the notion of being endlessly miserable as fuel to your fire it’s something. I may sit here sometimes and sink into the misery I am creating for the moment, but if I really look at it, I am super lucky. Luckier than I have ever been. I used to call this factory zen – I could find something to love in every job I did, and it really is the key. Find that and nothing will seem quite so bleak – find a way to celebrate something about the life you are living and you will save yourself.