The title here sounds a wee bit pessimistic, huh? But it isn't. (Mostly, it isn't.)
I was out to breakfast with a writing friend who was feeling meh about her various works-in-progress. She has fond memories of writing a particular book and longs to experience that joyful writing experience again. I was, alas, a jerk-face who assured her that those easy writing experiences are rare for most of us. In general, writing a novel is a brutal slog whose reward is being finished. Except you're never finished because the book is never, ever, ever perfect. Because writers are human, and humans are staggeringly imperfect, and so the writing of that amazing idea in your head is flawed from the get-go. I told her, "To write it is to ruin it." And I was so struck by my own brilliance that I scrambled for my notebook and jotted down that line.
To write it is to ruin it.
No matter how fantastic your story idea is, you are going to ruin it with your horrible trash-words and clumsy plotting and human-characters-who-aren't-fully-human-because-they-have-been-reduced-to-paper-and-ink. All you can do is try to make the story as good as you, a mere human, can get it.
It's oddly liberating, isn't it? I found myself giddy at the thought, like George Bailey joyfully shouting, "My mouth's bleeding, Bert! My mouth's bleeding!" in It's a Wonderful Life when he realizes that he exists again. He's so happy to be alive that getting punched in the face and looking at a possible jail sentence are cause for celebration.
I am at this moment completely ruining the passion project of my heart, and I'm thrilled, because I'd rather be writing it than not writing it. Here's hoping it will one day see the light of day.
