Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Stop saying query

Query the Third lies jumbled at the bottom of a notebook, coiled like a sleeping snake. When the time is right I shall release it to strike!

What surprises me is how similar these all are. That suggests two possibilities:

1) I have Hit The Mark, and now it's just a matter of reworking sentences. Sentences which must be reworked. I need to revise sentences. Certain sentences demand improvement. Fixing sentences. Reworking phrasing. See what I mean?

2) I've deftly avoided an effective query, but can't jump out of the rut because I've gotten used to it. Human beings can adjust to almost anything: this is our salvation and our curse. In this case I worry that I'm so accustomed to this basic query that it's blinding me to possible alternatives.

Meanwhile, winter's bite is gone from the wind and trees are showing their first tentative buds. Spring trickles in and reminds us that the clock of winter ticks away, ticks away, ticks away.

Yet the boat languishes, a victim of cold weather. How can I glue things -- I bleat plaintively -- when it's too cold for the glue to set? How convenient, I answer, that cold weather arrived just when the revision and query process jolts into high gear.

But with winter ticking away I find myself peering into the garage at the skeletal boat. Soon.

1 comment:

Babs said...

Hmmm...this could be called the February blahs. Spring is not here yet but teases us with a few quick warm days then settles back into cold weary days. Why not put a copy of your query onto your sleeping boat and put a pkg. of epoxy onto a copy of the draft of your book?