Revision Season #7: The Same But Different
On pauses, finding new ways to say the damn thing, and origin stories.
Hi Friends!
Thought I’d start by sharing a Talk Soon deep cut. It’s the post people who’ve been with my work for a long time still mention to me, and was written pre-Substack days when I was just figuring out what I wanted to say and the voice to say it in. It’s about back-to-school time, which can be hell (though I’m pleased to note, as I apparently did 5 years ago, I did not clean up vomit on the first day of school this year), and about Rosh Hashana —one of my favorite holidays—and time, of course, and cycles, of course. Here’s a taste of where my head was 5 years ago at about this time:
I love this idea of letting go, of an attempt at least, to release, and to think of oneself as capable of doing so. And yet, too, the challah is typically round for this holiday, and that circle represents a year, and I like this, this reminder to stop and reflect and mark a moving forward but not to pretend, as it seems the secular New Year does, that you can simply abandon what has come before.
I like finding myself in a place where I’ve been before not because it’s a comfort necessarily but because it’s a reflection point, a pause, even. When I teach writing process, I call these assessment points: moments where you should consider what you have and what you want to have, what has changed and what needs to change. You do this assessing in isolation, before moving forward to acting on what you’ve learned about where you are, and where you’ve been. It is a complete and necessary act unto itself, and it should be honored as a distinct step in the process.
I’m thinking, as I always do at this time of year, of Rabbi Alan Lew’s incredible book, This is Real and You Are Completely Unprepared about the high holy days for Jews, the gift of being made to ask the vital assessment question of whether our lives reflect the meaning we want them to. Through you know, play-acting your own death, more or less. I didn’t grow up going to services, nor do I attend now, but I’ve long felt a deep connection to the rituals and reflections that take place during the Days of Awe and recommend this book to anyone who has the above question.
Assessment points can also be about considering the changes in the span of whatever time. Within six months of writing the above post, I’d find out I have celiac disease, and am thus allergic to gluten/the bread that was the central image of that post and which I took for granted as both a familiar comfort and symbol. While the celiac discovery saved my intestines it also upended my relationship to food, and sharing it with others (eating out will always be tricky, and having others cook for me is nearly impossible). By then baking was a thing I’d taught myself how to do as an adult and which gave me solace against things like losing my writing time to childcare (ironic, as I learned most of it when I was childless and had a lot of time to write, and was avoiding the page). Baking was a way to please both myself and deliver pleasure and care to other people. I wish I could say now, 4 years post diagnosis, that I’ve reoriented my relationship to food and baking, but I’m still working on it.
Perhaps it’s obvious to say that revision is also a working through a cycle, reflecting on what stays the same and what is—or needs to be—different. Revision puts you right up against your limits, your expectations, your potential, your choices. Often, it asks if you can accept what is, if something means what you’d most like for it to mean.
Before we get into the revision lists, I have to say that I thought this newsletter was maybe off track, maybe a re-run of ideas I’ve said before but 1. if so, that’s fine and 2. I’m realizing how, in a while when I can share more details of the book’s content with you, you’ll see how deeply tied to the novel so much of the above content actually is.
On that note, here we are again in the revision lists.
What I’ve Done
Fell behind my schedule (a sinus infection, then me pretending back-to-school isn’t a bananas time, then more struggle and subsequent slowness). I also allowed myself to do this. Remembered my schedule is only my schedule and a few days here or there don’t make a difference in getting the book done. I am getting the book done. I am doing it.
Retyped the first section of chapter 6 from the top, truly making it new. It helped and it was brutal.
Worked out of order, because that first section was so hard, and I had about 22% of my brain operational on the week I was working on it. See: sinus infection.
Drew the downstairs of the characters’ house layout, which I’ve done before, to figure out some scene choreography. Did the same for a dinner table seating chart, which was new, also fun.
Read/annotated chapter 7. Picked up the pages and said FUCK about twelve times over them like a demented prayer. I knew one section required a lot of big choices. But I made them. Worked on that on September 7th, the day my children finally went back to school. It’s a day when I want to lie on the floor in blissful silence and also of course work in it. It was real feel 100 degrees, the dog was depressed, but I unlocked a key detail about a character’s origin story that finally finally finally made sense for her, one I’d been chasing for some time. It’s difficult to find the right scale for backstory. All characters have relationships and families and places of origin but if you give these too much space or weight you risk writing a book about the past and not the present. The pressure on this balance was heightened because for plot reasons, my character had to go home, to Los Angeles (most of the book takes place in New England). I knew that what and who she would encounter there mattered, but only so far as it inflected the present moment. Did I nail it? To be determined! Not by me, not now.
What I’m Doing Now/What’s Ahead
Still entering chapter 7 edits. I was supposed to be reading chapter 8 by now, but I’m 4 days behind, and with hosting Rosh Hashana for 15, various appointments, the return of my spouse’s work travel, I don’t know that I’ll catch up. On September 8th, I wrote this in my notebook, on a page I keep every month to track process (an idea borrowed from the brilliant Danya Kakafka): Edits, 7.1. VERY SLOW, difficult. Only 3 pages in. Anxiety? Feelings.
Oddly, despite this, it feels like I can see the end. I know that chapter 10 is much shorter than the others, and I recall chapters 8 and 9 being in better shape overall than the middle ones, which I am just exiting. Two weeks will tell, won’t they?
What I’ve Learned
The power of the strike through. I’m crossing out lines and paragraphs and pages and secondary characters and it feels great. Deleting whole paragraphs is oddly easy. I’m plagued by doubt about the book as a whole but the lines are simple to strike, to see what’s superfluous (what a word! I wouldn’t strike that one!).
What I’m Afraid Of
That every section is a different tense. I tend to write in the present tense (the horrors) and then will make it past because that is what one is “supposed” to do but then I start editing and it seems weird to me and I know I’ve made a Frankenstein out of many chapters. Advance apologies to my first-round readers. It’s not that tense doesn’t matter—quite the contrary!—but this is a fixable, if annoying problem, to be dealt with later.
Religion of Office Supplies Report
I’m not sure if this is technically an office supply, but wow, am I making a lot of use of my computer’s thesaurus. I do have a Synonym Finder, which I adore (I’m the kid who used to love reading the dictionary; I can still recall the weight of it on my lap as I type this, the slide of those thin pages against one another) but it’s rather convenient to highlight a word I’ve used a hundred times in my manuscript and explore what else I might say. It’s for sure a bit of a procrastination tool but the sort that takes just long enough for a break but not derail me entirely.
Where to Find Me
Shilling my fall offerings, which include a generative class, a one-day reverse outlining seminar, and, if the stars align, group coaching. If you want to get these offerings before anyone else, sign up for that newsletter here. I’m also actively seeking more manuscripts and coaching clients this fall. If that’s you, get in touch.
Attempting to bake gluten free challah again. It failed me last year, or I failed it. Like I said, it’s been a complicated relationship with bread/food/baking these past few years.
Applying for so many residencies, because what has helped my work the most is time to work as though I don’t have a family or a home I’m responsible for. Holding my nose a bit as I pay the application fees on them, which are now rarely below $30 and I’ve seen go as high as $501. Last year I paid about $350 all told to shoot my shot at various residencies, none of which panned out. One of my dearest clients (made even dearer by what’s to follow) sent me money2 for a few of my fees this fall so I could get the hell out of my own way. If you’re thinking about upgrading to a paid subscription, know that this is exactly the sort of thing that subscriptions pay for: me getting the hell out of my own way.
L’shana tova, a sweet new year to all my readers who celebrate, in whatever way you do.
Talk Soon,
Danielle
Look, I know they have to fund the residencies, and pay people to read the apps (god I hope the orgs are doing this), but it’s definitely a price creep I’ve observed in the past couple of years. And let’s not talk about the residencies that ask you pay 4-figure sums per week to be at them. There is no prestige in this! You can 100% get a vacation rental with creative friends for a lot less, and write it off, and not have to sleep in a dorm or talk to strangers at mealtimes.
If you’re gonna do something without someone’s consent, sending them money is a nice thing to do that way. You know who you are and I’m grateful for you!
As always, Danielle, you have me thinking about writing in this post AND laughing out loud. Fave line in this one: and not have to sleep in a dorm or talk to strangers at mealtimes. I completely agree! But seriously. I LOVE that you are sharing this revision process with us. It is educational and entertaining. I look forward to reading this novel when it is published, and then maybe even geeking out with you and your students in a future workshop over the specific revisions you made. Your revision process is geekily and creatively fascinating. Also, I have become your newest Office Supplies Apostle. I just splurged and bought some office supplies for myself. Indeed, it fed my Virgo soul!