Back in 2002, when the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books was still held at UCLA instead of USC where they have it now, I attended for the first time and met Maya Angelou. Well, met might be too strong of a word for our encounter. She was on the stage and I asked her a question from a mic in the audience.
My question was, “How do you know when a work is finished?” Too bad I only vaguely recall her answer. Part of what she said had to do with having a publisher and a deadline. Something I don’t have to think about because I’m now self-publishing, although I should because I’m also wasting time. The other part of what she said was you just know.
That’s the type of response that I was, and often times still am, afraid of – one that leaves the answer up to me. Perhaps that’s because I want someone else to blame if things go wrong. But how could they go wrong? Maybe just someone else to point the finger at if things don’t turn out the way I want…the way society has taught me someone becomes a success.
Recently I came across an old notebook of mine from that same year. That was also the year I finished writing my novella. I called it a short story back then. It was a long short story, but a short story nonetheless. It was interesting to see where my headspace was at that time. My writing was sporadic and literally all over the place. I’d write in one notebook one day and another the next – just which ever one was handy at the time. Then maybe I wouldn’t write at all for a month or two…hmp, I guess I still do that.
It was July of 2002 on the page that I had come to in this old notebook. I had just sent off my story to The New Yorker and was expressing my faith that they would accept it, yet still nervous about what would happen if they didn’t. Part of what was hanging ’round my mind was not only whether or not my story was good enough, but also was it finished. I’d spent a little over a year writing it. The majority of that time was devoted to wrestling with the fact that the story in my head was so much better, more vivid than what I managed to extract from my imagination onto the page. My challenge was to try and squeeze out more. My anguish was, try as I may, it was a futile effort, an unwinnable sway. And when the rejection ultimately came, it served to confirm my fear.
It’s funny, I’ve lived more years since I wrote that story, than I had when I finished it. I’m more than twice as old now as I was then. People say, if I only had more time, when it comes to things like this. I have had nothing but time, and yet even time could not permit me to tell a better story – one where I could finally say this is everything I want it to be. Twenty-two years later, I took the story up again, this time to self-publish it. I’m already two and a half years in, and I find once again, time is toying with me.
As I went through accepting or rejecting the corrections of an unimpressive editor I hired, I still found myself tweaking the story. About a week or so ago, I finally finished reviewing all of her edits. Most of the revisions I made were in the last chapter. It was nothing drastic—I’m fighting to remain as true to the voice and the story I told back when I was 22 as I can, but there were parts of that last chapter that just seemed too underdeveloped.
Have you ever taken up a task where you have lots of energy in the beginning, both physical and mental energy that allows you to be meticulous, and precise, maybe even patient to some extent, with whatever you’re doing? Then by the middle, you’ve already been doing it for a while, it’s more familiar, so the middle benefits from your beginning. But by the time the end comes along, you’re exhausted. You just want this thing to be over?
As I was going over the editor’s edits, when I came to the last chapter, that’s what it felt like. It felt like in some parts I had dropped the ball, because I wanted that year of torture, writing this thing, to be over. But it wasn’t just because I wanted it to be over. It was also because I’d truly given all I had to give to the story at that time.
Now reading it back, I wanted to make it better. I’d caught things that I’d never caught before – not even two years ago when I first embarked upon my self-publishing journey. And thus, a new battle of sorts began – one where I wrestle with staying true to the way the story was 24 years ago when I was 22, or “improving” it with the fresh eyes I have now. Ultimately, it came down to what I thought was best for the reader. And so, I tweaked a few things, added more descriptions to make it be easier for the reader to see this world I saw the character in.
Frankly, I could have kept going, but then I thought about something I initially read, oddly enough, back in 2002 as well. It’s my favorite chapter in one of my favorite author’s autobiography – “Dust Tracks on a Road” by Zora Neale Hurston. What a title that is. Anyway, the chapter is called “Books and Things.” In it, she details the hurdles she went through while writing and getting her books published. It was truly fascinating to read about the obstacles she encountered including the ones associated with living in a time before computers. There’s one passage, in particular, that spoke to me in my current situation. In it she wrote:
I wrote “Their Eyes Were Watching God” in Haiti. It was dammed up in me, and I wrote it under internal pressure in seven weeks. I wish that I could write it again. In fact, I regret all of my books. It is one of the tragedies of life that one cannot have all the wisdom one is ever to possess in the beginning. Perhaps, it is just as well to be rash and foolish for a while. If writers were too wise, perhaps no books would get written at all.
I’ve read that chapter several times since 2002, but it’s still been years since I last revisited it. So it’s funny how it came to mind as I was going over my novella’s final chapter. I specifically sought that passage out to help guide me, and came to the decision, as I have before, that with this story I can do no more.
This time I’m going to make it stick. I think it may even border on arrogance, if not completely cross that line, to think that I can give it more. I have come to terms with the fact that this story I wrote is imperfect, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be impactful. That doesn’t mean it can’t still be loved and felt and bless somebody. At some point I just have to trust that the reader’s life and experiences and imagination will create what I couldn’t. But honestly, I’ve given this story all I’ve got. I have nothing left to give, except to give it away to you…you know, for a small fee…to be determined once I get further along with this self-publishing thing.
PS:
If you’ve been here before, you know I’ve said something similar to this before about letting the story go. Hopefully, this time I mean it.
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