Writing is being patient.

Finished my fourth chapter of I'M ONLY HUMAN just in time for writer's group.

I had a challenging scene that I couldn't quite focus on, so I thought I'd just leave it for the beginning of the next chapter. But this chapter didn't work without it, so I pounded it out in the last half hour before leaving, and it was fine.

Being fine is what I'm shooting for.

I tend to underwrite my first draft, instead of over write. Just in the process of rewriting, I tend to fill in a lot of holes.

That's the thing I'm finding -- or rediscovering. A book isn't something that coalesces easily for me-- things like names have to be tried for awhile before I decide if they work; plots have elements I don't see the first time, writing can always be sharpened and refined.

The main thing is to get the story on it's way...

I think 5 or 6 chapters is as far as I've gotten with any story since I stopped being a full time writer -- so in a few more chapters I'll be in new territory.

This last chapter was more workmanlike than the first couple chapters -- less flowing out of inspiration and more pounded out from necessity. Probably the way it will be from here on out. But there is great satisfaction in getting it done, especially since it doesn't flow easily.

Actually I don't think it's bad thing for me to be unpolished for the first draft. I need the feeling that I'm accomplishing some creativity the second time around and even -- probably going to be necessary -- a third time around.

Like I said, the work process itself is what I need to keep control of -- that I neither underwrite or overwrite, but give the recipe time to develop.