Ever feel like you're going nowhere fast? That's what this new draft of Residuals feels like. The pages are slow and methodical. The characterization is deeper and the imagery more pronounced. I'm learning new things about myself and the craft but there is one thing I cannot get out of my head:
I'm reworking a manuscript without any guarantee this draft will be any more marketable than the original.
Such is the life of a writer.
I chose this stairway, stretching out before me long and twisting with no forseable end because it reminds me that I'm cutting my own path. When you step into a path, there are no guarantees but the hope of dreams of reaching the goals you set for yourself. My way is unclear and treacherous. It requires me to take one step at a time. Through stumbles and restarts I've sustained bruises and abrasions to my ego and fortitude. But I've also gained strength and determination and a deeper understanding I didn't believe possible.
On any journey, rest and reflexion is required at certain points. I believe I've reached mine, a crook in the road on this winding path in which I have a decision to make about which way to go next. Do I take the clear path, made safe by so many before me? Or do I continue to cut my own path, hacking away at the underbrush until I find a foothold I can trust?
I don't know. That's why I'm taking a writing sabatical to ponder at this personal turning point.
Sherry
4 comments:
Oh, Sherry, what a great meditative post. I wish I had the answers for you. I think at some level we just have to trust that nagging instinct we've honed for so long. It's gotten you this far. It'll get you the rest of the way.
Sabbatical pow-wows go well with martinis. Call if you need us.
I was told once that writing is a lot like driving across country at night with nothing but your dim headlights. You can only see a few feet ahead of you, yet you can make it all the way across country a few feet at a time.
Your staircase reminds me of that. It might seem unending, but each step takes you closer to your goal. Your revisions might seem unending, but there is an end.
And the question isn't whether or not the book will be marketable in the end, but whether you'll like the changes you made to your manuscript. We write because it feels good to us, because it feeds our souls, because it allows us to put something of ourselves on paper so that other people can see our gooey insides.
So regardless of how marketable someone else might declare your book to be by the time you find that last step of your staircase, the true hope, or at least my hope for you, is that you find this book enjoyable and better for your efforts.
Enjoy your sabbatical.
I love that analogy, Mary. Dim headlights on a cross-country trip is exactly what writing a novel feels like. I'm somewhere in a Nebraska cornfield right now. AH!
Ah, fellow writers, look for the moon. Sometimes, the path is a little brighter when we least expect it.
Personally, Sherry, I would have given you a stairway into the clouds because that's where you're headed -- up, always up toward success.
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