Writer’s Diary #33 – Emergent structure, or work more; think less

This morning, I did a lot of fiddling and reworking the text of a chapter, looking for it order. I read, printed it out, made tentative edits, and reviewed it. I moved chunks of text around, created an outline, and made changes iteratively. After the morning, I have the beginning of an outline.

I can’t see through the project, but I can begin to feel like I could maybe move through it and begin to make sense of it.

What did I do?

I worked at it from 6:00 am to 9:15 am. I read bits of it but moved them around in an outline. I did some queries and a little programming, but mostly I organized, reorganized, worked, and revised. I had no plan. But I read and edited and outlined and moved and renamed. I had a shower, and remembered a scene, and went and found that, and I started to find some order.

Is it perfect? No. But I can begin to get a sense of the chapter.

Tomorrow, I will keep at it.

Mostly, it feels like a structure is emerging. That’s more than I had on the weekend. It feels great.…