Not much else to report on this fine Sunday. Just finished another revision on my 2nd / 4th novel*, Enter Title Here, and decided it was finally time to send it to readers (and my agent) for comments. I really like this one. It almost makes me sad that it's already written...that I'll never again have the experience of writing it for the first time (I wrote the first draft over the course of about 28 days, most of which were while I was in India over winter break). I'm sure I'll write better novels in the future, but, well, the future always feels impossibly distant. And then when it comes, it's over so fast. Looking back, I've realized that I actually do revise my novels considerably (except when I abandon them completely). But it always feels like 90% of their goodness is implanted within them during the initial drafting phase. Later revision can extract the badness, but it can't necessarily add in more goodness. That's why it often feels more productive, to me, to abandon a book that's not working and go to work on the next one.
Not sure what I'll do next. Maybe I'll revise some short stories. I have some unrevised stories that're as old as January of 2012 (more than 18 months ago). If I leave them any longer, I won't even want to look at them anymore. Usually, I have a basic sense of what I want to do with them, but I can be a bit lazy about actually going ahead and doing that thing. In some cases, they just need to be polished up and then sent out into the world to fend for themselves--they're not worth the effort it'd take to make them better.
And then there're some novel-related things to do. I really have to do some more revisions on the novel that I drafted in secret over the summer (my 5th) . But I think I am saving that for the winter break.
Part of me really just wants to start a new novel. I have an idea that I am super excited by. Been kicking it around for a bit. But if I've learned anything, it's that the good ideas don't really go away.
Anyway, I've been feeling pretty happy lately. I like having a routine. And I also like working on new things. Sometimes I feel like there's nothing left in life to do except all the stuff I know how to do. But I don't feel like that right now. Right now I feel like life will be full of things that I can't really imagine.
Amongst twentysomethings, there's such a fear of aging. And there's something to that. Life does become different as you age. You can't party like crazy. Your brain loses some of its plasticity. But you also get to do great stuff. Like...be good at stuff. Produce original work. Be in charge of shit. Make major life decisions. Create tiny humans.
It all (well, except for the tiny humans) sounds very intriguing.
*I've written first drafts of five novels, but I decided not to revise or market the 1st and 3rd novels (both were adult science fiction novels) .