Day: March 4, 2008

Lesson learned

By / March 4, 2008 / 4 Comments

Note to self: You can not do it all. There is a difference between self sufficiency and a stubborn refusal to ask for help. Even if you are capable of learning something, it often makes more sense to ask for help from someone who already knows how.

This note courtesy of Howard taking over the image editing for Hold on to Your Horses and doing a far better job in two hours than I’d been able to accomplish in two weeks of tweaking. From now on all the image editing needs to stay in the hands of the expert. I’ll stick to layout and design.

The note is also courtesy of Eric Stone who flawlessly implemented my website plan in less than a day. There are still things to tweak, but going solo it would have taken me several frustrating weeks to reach the tweaking stage. Again I should stick with layout. I’m good at organizing things that are already there.

Critiquing

By / March 4, 2008 / 1 Comment

My brother-in-law is writing his first novel. He’d gotten to a point where he felt stuck, so I offered to read it and talk it over. This evening he and I had an hour-long conversation about where his novel is now and what it needs to go forward. I love this type of conversation. I love reading something, then sitting down with the author and discussing it. I love being able to make concrete suggestions and then to alter my suggestions based on new information about what the author wants the story to be. I love being able to assist in helping a good story emerge from the necessary mess of the first draft. I love picking apart the structure of a story and being able to see how if I want this then that needs to shift. I love hearing the author’s voice take on the thoughtful tone which means he is now seeing his own story in a new way.

I need to make more space in my life for this. It will be several months before I can make regular space, but at least now I’m reminded that I want it.