The Proof of My Diligence
And now a post for my agent. Well, not really, or else I'd just email it to her. But it's with her in mind, and the fact that she has asked me twice, 'Where's that novel?', that I present to you the proof that I am working diligently on my pretty little novel despite plenty of distractions otherwise. Exhibit A is that I am only THIS FAR (at right) into a book that I love and adore and started quite some time ago. Elizabeth Gilbert says on the front cover, "Treat yourself to this book," which is brilliant wording because it's so good you can taste it. Now I'm not a speed-reader anyway. I prefer to sink into good books and live there a while. But, believe me, I would have been through this baby by now if I wasn't trying to write [a completely substandard in comparison] one instead.
Exhibit B is this gorgeous stack of InStyle magazines. Do you see how far back these go? JULY. That's how far behind I am on the ONLY MAGAZINE I EVEN READ. These magazines are actually awesome inspiration for the novel I'm writing, but since I've read a few hundred up until now, I haven't touched these in order to actually write.As an aside, I don't even know if this book is something that will ever be published. I read doom and gloom and trouble and difficulty and crazy impossible odds all day long about ever getting published in this day and age and all that times ten that even if you get published you'll actually be successful at it long term. It's not pretty, People. Frankly, at this point, I only press on because it really is fun. A movie director once told me (via the DVD commentary I was watching) that you should do something creative every day. And this is my creative thing.
And Exhibit C: This wall, against which there should be a Christmas tree by now. You can see Mom's bag of presents (she wraps up one little gift for the whole family for each day in December) sitting so lonely beneath - this plant.
To really understand this exhibit you have to know that I seriously wake up every morning giddy because it's the month of Christmas and it feels like Christmas and today it even smelled like snow and I already have gifts bought (which is SO RARE for me) and I HEART Christmas. Now, truth be told, I didn't write so much this weekend that I couldn't have squeezed in a trip to Fouch's Christmas Tree Farm. But even when I wasn't writing, I was thinking about my novel and when I would work on it and when I would finally finish it and whether or not it was any good, etc., etc., etc., and I just couldn't find the mental energy to also say, "Hey, let's go get our tree."
And there you have it. Proof, baby. It's coming! It really is coming. The last chapters need way fewer rewrites than the early ones, and did you see the stack of magazines?
(P.S. Michael says he'd like to hack my account and write a follow-up post with three pictures that prove to Holly I am lying. Exhibit A would be the stack of Friends DVDs beside me. He's got nothing. Nothing. Give me 'til Christmas, and if I don't have that novel headed her way, then he can blame it on Friends.)