The Bestest-est-est feeling
Finishing a draft of a short story and sending it to your first reader.
Ahhhhhh......kind of like giving birth (er, a metaphoric birth, so as not to offend any mothers out there!)
Ahhhhhh......kind of like giving birth (er, a metaphoric birth, so as not to offend any mothers out there!)
posted by TessaJ at 4:04 PM
9 Comments:
congrats. i love that feeling. in fact, it's the most pure feeling to have, getting it exactly the way you want it before whoever you send it to has "suggestions".
i'm reading a book of interviews with modern directors, and joe carnahan (narc) said that the best version is always the first version, because the characters and scenes and everything is still as you imagine it. so true, so true
enjoy it.
wow. awful grammar error in my post.
i is apology.
No worries! I caught your point. There are a few places I need to expand on (where I needed help with character motivation and so on -- I tend to write until I get frustrated more than write until it feels "finished") but in general, I do love the purity of the moment.
Funny, though. Last night I was backing up old stories I wrote (I'm talking back from 1994) and they were so corny and cheesy. But I loved reading every single one!
I always just feel sheer terror when I hand over a story. I never seem to feel relief. No matter what point I'm at, I tend to feel like it's not finished yet...which may be why I never manage to send anything out. ;-)
Sending stuff out is way, way, way in the future. I tend to hide things (in a box under the bed, I used to say -- though now it'd be a folder on my desktop) and forget about them. Then, by the time I re-read them, I think, "That sucks. I write so much better now."
And then stick the "much better" stuff in a box under the bed, where I forget about it...and on and on.
Aw, thanks nikki. I just got some good feedback from my friend (actually I got some last night, and we've been e-mailing back and forth about it) that is really helping me with the trouble spots I was having. Back to work!
sometimes i teach copywriting at the advertising school, and when my students are down because of how hard it is, i'll tell them that i got a package of work from a prospective student and that the work is so bad, that i need their help to form feedback. so i'll put the work on the board, and we have a good time ripping it apart.
then i tell them that the work is actually mine, right before i went to ad school.
and i gotta tell you: it's horrible stuff.
but that's the beauty of time passing.
Yeah, I am pretty critical of myself (I went through the "I suck" moment last night when re-reading things) but it is always lovely to see just how much I have improved. I think that's one thing my students can't fathom: how much work it takes to be "good" at something, and also how few of us ever stop wanting to improve.
Oh my god, I'm just sitting down to catch up on your blog and this post made me jump to click the comments button and CONGRATULATE you x 1000000000. I am so proud of you and know how elated you must feel. Geez, can I say that again - I am so damn proud of you. I can't wait to read it.
Post a Comment
<< Home