The White Star Line wineglass

Writers are superstitious creatures; do not mess with our rituals.

I can’t remember what we were celebrating, but it may have been Thanksgiving. We were attempting to find enough wine glasses in my mishmash collection for everyone in the room to have a glass. There is one glass left over from my first marriage, the tattered remnants of the small set my husband and I received when we got married, a promotional glass from some winery somewhere, an oversized one from a Disney World reception…

My son pulled out a wine glass from the back of the china cabinet, and I stopped him immediately. “Oh no, not that one.”

He stared at it, surprised. “Why not this one?

“I’ll tell you a story sometime,” I said. “But that one doesn’t get used, ever.“

He made me explain, and then I got the look of, “crazy writer-mom strikes again.”

If you Google writer rituals, what you’ll get is a lot of helpful how-to’s detailing how you write a book. I’ve only ever found one bit of writing that talks about what you do when you finish a book. In Stephen King’s Misery, his main character has a ritual whenever he finishes a book. He drinks Dom Perignon and he smokes a cigarette, the only cigarette he allows himself after having quit. And being an incredibly wealthy, successful author, of course, he…