Monday, February 26, 2007

One way or another


For the record, I have no idea what 'suspiciously familiar' means.

So, two weekends ago (Thursday/Friday included) I had all the time in the world. W/ a four-day stretch of nojob ahead of me, I was easily on track to polish off the first draft of my RW story. Yet when Monday rolled around and still I had no draft to wave happily in the air, it occurred to me that I'd totally eff'd up. I had more than enough research and source quotes to work w/, but all for nothing. Or so it seemed. Then Tuesday morning happened. After flinging myself about the apartment in an incredible show of distress, swearing like a mother as I tore through my closet in search of something to wear that wasn't white athletic socks, all the while mourning my status as one wretched excuse for a writer, I got myself to the office, where I proceeded to wrangle already-written sentences into paragraphs, paragraphs into a story, w/ the ease of, of... someone who knows what she's doing. No shit!

At least it hit eventually, 'cause I hate to consider the alternative. ("Sorry Katie, the thing just wouldn't gel. I got nothin' for ya.") In the days that followed, thinking about the hideous experience, I realized the problem. I'd been way too dogged in the way I went about writing this one. From the moment I got that first paragraph down, I refused to budge, refused to consider that maybe there was a clearer, more efficient way of telling the story--and it's not a complicated one, either. What I needed to do, I now see, was to turn the thing around, to start from the end, pretty much. Which was what I did, literally cutting & pasting my way to completion.

Cupcakes would be so much easier.

Posted by princess kanomanom @ 5:45 PM