I've heard through the grapevine that drugs make you feel REALLY good. Maybe it's true, maybe it's not. (Today's Full Grown People essay sure had me thinking about that...) What I do know is that my favorite high in the world comes from having written something that feels right. As a not-very-prolific writer, I don't get a whole lot of the instant gratification of publishing smaller pieces (but when I do, it's a kick). I also have more shitty writing days than I ever care to share, and I can think of few things worse than those long periods when the right words just won't come, or when anything I manage to get down sounds like disingenuous crap. But those golden days, when the writing just comes, and the action is great and the suspense and emotion are so real that you get amped up and the tears come, are the best days. They compensate for the crap days, and then some. Those days (today is one, can you tell?) are the ones that make me feel like I haven't chosen the wrong career path; like I'm not wasting away my precious days in pursuit of this wild, incredible, faraway dream.
On that note, the skeleton for the fourth draft of my first novel is nearly ready. I think the next month or two of my life will be lived in a Starbucks (or a less mainstream alternative), poring over my words in search of errant phrases, bad metaphors, and continuity issues. Hopefully, this thing will be ready for a third round of queries in a matter of months. I'm happy, this time around, to take the slower road and really get down into the dirt. Writing isn't a race; the tortoise is often more successful, from the true-life stories I've read, than the hare. And, damn it, I'm determined.
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