writing is a funny thing. it can be so much messier than we think it is, because we usually only see people's work after it's been revised many times. it's easy to think that it's easy to get there, but this isn't necessarily true.
I'm working on three essays that I hope to have close to finished by the end of this month and one of them is taking a clear lead. each time I go back to it to revise I ask myself what the essay is about anyway -- and it seems like I should know, you know? but I don't know exactly what it's about, the deeper meaning. it's becoming more clear as I work with it, but it's interesting how we aren't necessarily conscious of what is embedded in a work. this is a therapeutic process, and one akin to excavation, as Stephen King writes in his memoir on writing.
it gives me hope to realize that I don't have to know what a work is about at first -- I just need to write it down as it surfaces to my fingertips and figure it out from there like a puzzle.
-- just hopefully not one of those weird puzzles, you know, ones with only a few colors or some pattern that is complete chaos so it will take a million years to finish. I don't want that puzzle, although sometimes it feels like that's what I have. so I try to set reasonable writing goals to write myself out of that kind of dense forest. and it's getting easier as I go, which must mean I am making progress.
I hope.
let's see what this year of December brings.
