“We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.” Oscar Wilde
“I wrote a script for a guy, and he said he liked it but he thought that I needed to rewrite it. I said, Screw that, I'll just make a copy.” Mitch Hedberg
There's another Oscar Wilde quote about writing that goes something like this: "Yesterday I spent four hours taking out a comma and today I spent four hours putting it back in." That's the idea anyway. I'll bet he was talking about the final stages of re-writing something. It could be a term paper or a poem or a short story. In my case it's a novel.
I'm right there at the point where I'm about to tell myself, "Okay, it's done already. Now you're spending entire days putting in and taking out commas. Screw it, let's make a copy." Still, it seems whatever place I open up the manuscript to, I find something egregious that needs changing. Not just commas, but idiotic, clumsy, over-written phrasing. And what about that new scene I'm thinking about inserting right in the middle of the book? Should I or shouldn't I? I've learned to trust my instincts when I write, but now, with the manuscript nearing its final form, my instincts are all muddled.
The good news is that yesterday, whilst raking up the winter detritus of our front yard, my wife found the wonderful flower pictured above, a very fine crocus. And then I went out to my sailboat and she posed for this lovely photo--kinda of an old, retired guys Playboy foldout with no staples in the middle. Ah!
So, mad dictators, savage politicians, and commas, and clumsy phrasing be damned, it's been a long, cold winter and these first harbingers of Spring will be enjoyed--celebrated, even. I've done all I can for humanity this week and I'm going to enjoy the spoils.
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