11Jun2017 putting the work in,

I am in the bowels of the rewrite for my thesis work "Serengeti on the Bayou," and I'm wrestling with the thinness of a scene.

When I wrote it a year ago I imagine me leaning back at the time with a huge smile at the completeness of it all.

(Almost assuredly not true, but nice imagery.)

Reading it now all I see is what it lacks.

The dialog flows but there's too little. The depth of the characters must be deeper, and the overall theme is not even hinted at. The result is little more than two guys sitting around talking about a murdered woman with nothing underneath.

So I go at it, One paragraph at a time, one line at a time. I'm reminding myself to go deep, to put little stories in to enhance background, to breathe, take my time so that later I can truly say I did my best.

It's a good story. I mean it was always a good story but it's better now, more focused, it finally has something to say. I guess in a way, I have something to say.

I went to grad school to learn how to write but not just how. I needed to know why, if what I said even mattered. I found it does. Just for the thing itself, to find a point, an issue, and expound on it.

I am all over the place emotionally today. Hurling mentally from happy to sad and back all within the confines of an hour. The writing harnesses all that, focuses that emotional energy into the work and I am stable again.

I am watching Tom Selleck playing Robert B. Parker's "Jesse Stone," on lifetime. Good writing and great characters make for a perfect Sunday and I am better.