Start to Finish

It occurs to me on Day Two of my vacation that now is my chance to finish something. I have a trove of beginnings and no ends in sight. I also have a fortnight of loosely scheduled outings around which I have ample time to write. Momentum is more easily maintained without a day job to jam a stick in my spokes.

I recently had a good, albeit brief, talk with a co-worker who is also a writer. We had a lull while awaiting another’s arrival to a meeting, and I asked her how she was doing in her real life. She has three projects on the go, and a set of creative challenges as unique to her as mine are to me. For instance, it takes her roughly five chapters to get momentum and start enjoying the process. “I hate beginnings,” she sighed.

By contrast, I am the opposite. I love beginnings and tend to lose momentum at five chapters—assuming I make it that far in the first place. These days, I’m lucky to write five pages before a project stalls. Hence my collection of half-finished stories, each begun with great enthusiasm and inevitably abandoned when I reach the early-midway point. If I persevere, the end will reveal itself and I emerge triumphant. Perseverance, however, is harder to employ now that my job has more responsibility and takes more of my mental energy than it once did.

But, hey, I’m on vacation! Instead of starting something new, I have decided to finish something already started. I’ve picked the piece, reviewed what already exists, and am now wondering where it will take me before I reach the end—but reach the end I will. I am resolved.

Actually, one might say the same thing about life in general.