Thoughts, so far, on being published:
The First Draft (not the first one you wrote, or even the first one you showed someone else, the fifth, sixth or seventh iteration, the one you finally send to a publisher) is your IDEA. And like all ideas, some parts of it just don’t work. So you have to let go of pieces. You have to let go of words, know that that paragraph you thought was absolutely perfect will never be read. It’s sad.
Then, when you’re finished learning to let go of stuff, mourning the loss of your words (sentimentality has no place here), you have to write new words. You have to take that IDEA and turn it into a story.
And you can’t help wondering if this Second Draft (which won’t be a first attempt, either, it will be honed and refined before anyone sees it, then tweaked again before being sent to your editor) is just another IDEA.
Hopefully it’s a better one?
I suppose it’s possible that, eventually, whatever decides to spill from your fingers and take over your life for a while will combine an idea with the right words and you actually start writing stories.
(Image borrowed from: Words of Yankees and Southerners)
Kelly Jensen 