The Story's End
The end is just the beginning.
Of all the moments we experience in the process of building a story out of nothing, I contend that, as writers, there is no greater moment than when we scribble The End at the bottom of a page of text—not just any text, a page of text preceded by often many, many pages of text. Those particular two words hold a special and very powerful meaning. The word The followed by End is reserved for a singular magical purpose: to mark the completion of the first draft of a story.
Short fiction, even flash fiction, novel-length works, it doesn't matter. That ending flourish brings with it a certain glee. It marks the end of the first stab at a narrative painstakinglyly extracted from our imaginations. It marks the completion of a solid beginning, followed by a compelling middle, that's concluded with a clever and impactful end. Only after all those pieces are in place do I allow myself to move the pen to the middle of the page and carefully scrawl The End.
We writers watch that final bit of ink dry with a stupid grin on our faces buoyed by an almost irrational giddyness, and then we close the notebook for a time, satisfied for the moment. If it was particularly long or difficult to produce, maybe we crack open the champagne, or take a blissful nap, or sit in the sun and read a book—something celebratory and usually enjoyed alone.
The celebration is temporary, of course, because, you see, the end is just the beginning. We take a break from the work know full well that there is still so much more yet to be done.
Writing that first draft is an ordeal. Like 22-year-old-Todd-after-a-college-bender rough. That's the draft that fills a blank notebook with a story. On some days, the creative juices flow, but on many others (most others?), my brain will cloud, and every step forward becomes a challenge—a slog. But, we writers march forward, placing one step in front of the other, until finally, we get to … The End.
Most of the time, I write that first draft longhand—with pen and ink. So, at the very least, it needs to be transcribed into a digital format. And as I transcribe, I revise. At this point in the journey, typos abound, and I don't care so much. I add and remove a gazillion commas and emdashes and restructure the work. I will sometimes scratch out entire blocks of narrative and add some new. All of this revision is done while also transcribing pen-and-ink cursive to digital text on the computer. And from this process is born … the second draft.
I often find the development of the second draft equal measures painful to joyful. Painful because this is when so many high-level decisions are made, many of which are not easy. But joyful because during this process, the story truly comes into its own for maybe the first time. The second draft focuses more on story and less on grammar, punctuation, and spelling. No one gets a peek at this rough-hewn story except maybe my critique group.
The third draft is born from another end-to-end walkthrough of the narrative. The story itself usually has solidified by this point unless major surgery has to happen. Surgery does happen, but you definitely hope to avoid making any significant changes. Assuming surgery is avoided, the more mechanical cleanup of grammar and structure, typos, and punctuation becomes a major focus. This is when I will employ applications like Grammarly to help find things I may have missed (did miss). (Note, Grammarly suggests changes and narrative repair; your own experience and expertise as a writer serve to judge the merit of its suggestions.) I also often strive to elevate the art of my prose during this phase, but it's not quite the emphasis yet.
The fourth through tenth through Nth drafts represent polishing phases. Pacing and structure are improved. The prose becomes more literary. More thought is put into theme and metaphor and subtext and subtly.
Somewhere between the fourth and Nth drafts,[1] I will share the story with Monica. I may even share it with other writers, just to get their feel for it. Other writers and beta readers can help point out deficiencies, though they are often far too kind with their criticisms. Monica thinks my first drafts are on par with Hemmingway, so the value of her input is limited. However, praise from a spouse is greatly beneficial to lifting one's spirit! In my opinion, they make it all worth the effort in the end.
The Nth through ZZZ drafts represent additional polishing phases. Danger lurks here. I will often find myself spiraling into a cycle of second-guesses and rewriting things that I really shouldn't rewrite. By this point, I will have rewritten the beginning and ending a gazillion times, where the best versions of each have likely already been lost. But they will still be better than what they were. And that's important.
Somewhere in the middle of all that, I will set the story aside and walk away for a while. It's important to let the story breathe, percolate, to let it brew. When I return, I read through the story with fresh eyes and invariably experience multiple moments of "Gah! How did I miss that!?!" And then I'll go through yet another series of revisions.
Finally, there will come a point where I squint, hold my breath, and declare with a decidedly unconfident voice, "Done! … ?"
Then, and only then, I will migrate the manuscript to LibreOffice, generate an industry standard MS-Word-formatted manuscript, and either file it away as "to be revisited" or submit the story somewhere to hopefully be published.[2]
All of those iterations are rewarding in themselves. Still, nothing quite captures that moment, that precise moment when at the tail end of the first draft, I pause, take a deep breath, and write …