song of the day

I thought that we’d be
Further along by now
I can’t remember how
We stumbled to this place . . .

I wanna do better
I wanna try harder
I wanna believe
Down to the letter

Jesus and Mary
Can you carry us
Across this ocean
Into the arms of forgiveness

I don’t mean to laugh outloud
I’m trying to come clean
Trying to shed my doubt
Maybe I should just keep
My big mouth shut . . .

So tell me your troubles
Let your pain rain down
I know my job I’ve been around
I invest in the mess
I’m a low cost dumping ground

Trouble is I’m so exhausted
The plot, you see, I think I’ve lost it
I need the grace to find what can’t be found

I wanna do better
I wanna try harder
I wanna believe
Down to the letter

Jesus and Mary
Can you carry us
Across this ocean
Into the arms of forgiveness


-- Linford Detweiler (Over the Rhine)

This is a Novel

And I wrote it.







Kind of an exciting thing to say. I mean, I've known I wanted to write books at least since I was ten (maybe longer); and while I've completed some long projects before (a novella in high school, a screenplay in college), I've never completed a full-length novel before. I wrote the last bit early one morning last week (right before having a wisdom tooth surgically removed, with local anaesthesia. Not an experience I want to repeat).

But this accomplishment is almost as daunting as it is exciting. Because when I say "this is a novel," I really mean "this is 200-odd pages of rough draft, and it still needs lots of time and attention before it's presentable." And, honestly, the thought of revising something this long is rather overwhelming . . . which is probably why I've barely looked at it since I finished it.

But hey, it's a novel.

And I wrote it.