377 days - Blog #66 the value of wrong

As I continue to read through this old manuscript, I am struck by how very different I am as a writer now.  It was only five years ago… really.  But my voice and narrative is such a different style.  I couldn’t put my finger on it, except that I understood that it wasn’t a very compelling narrative.  I am not drawn in by every sentence.  Indeed, I find myself skimming through the dialogue to comprehend the major plot point.  I’m not compelled.

But five years.  Really?  I know there has been a lot of water under the bridge since then… but there is a lot of me that is the same.  

On Sunday, I walked through the Gardner Museum with my aunt and her friend.  I caught myself in the first gallery being one of THOSE guests.  The ones who always made me draw in an unhappy sigh because a little bit of knowledge meant they knew everything.  I catch myself doing that at museums or any place with a moderate amount of trivia in its history.  I like to collect trivia and history… so I just assume everyone else wants to know what I know.  Worse yet, I think I know it all.  I did catch myself FINALLY at the Gardner.  I stopped making ASSumptions about things and did that which I should have done at the beginning.  I asked a question.  It led to other questions… and it got other visitors asking the gallery attendant questions so she was no longer just sitting there bored with her book.  I learned something that I didn’t know.  Those fireplaces were working fireplaces back in the day of Mrs. Gardner.  Everything was lit by candlelight.  That little piece of information made me realize how much I did not know yet… how much I still have yet to learn by going back when I have more time to ask questions of every guide in every room (okay, maybe not that much… but still more).  But the most important part of this, the story was better for letting myself not know everything and allowing myself to discover.

I realized earlier today that is what is wrong with this older manuscript.  I write like that snooty know-it-all.  I was contemplating how I would describe the layout of the castle in the first scene.  There would be an inner wall and an outer wall.  But would there be grass between the inner wall and the keep?  Would that make sense?  Would anyone really care?  It is a fantasy.  I’ve forgotten the actual accuracies and will have to pull out one of my many dusty books on the matter… except I don’t think it really matters.  Because it is that obnoxious I know everything way of telling things.  The I am always right voice.  Not the, hey let’s wait and see and figure this out, I could be wrong but let’s figure it out together way of telling a story.

In other words, the human way.

I’m starting to realize the best thing I’ve ever done to improve my writing is to let myself be wrong.  To not try so hard to be perfect.  To allow myself a mistake or two or five or fifty.

I’ve been having a lot of conversations this week about Nanowrimo – the one month writing frenzy that takes place in November.  It is a really tough exercise, not just because it forces discipline… but it also requires that letting go of perfection.  It unravels that need to be so perfect, so absolutely articulate, so 100% right.  It gives one the freedom to just go ahead and write.  To be a little bit wrong, but absolutely true to oneself.

So okay, there is still going to be an inner wall and outer wall of the castle.  But the grass?  Well whatever.  We can figure it out.