Perspiration

Yesterday afternoon I went out for a run, a habit I’ve had for going on two decades now. In Texas a run in July usually means scorching hot temperatures with a nice dose of humidity. This week, though, temperatures are unseasonably cool, ratcheting up only into the upper 80s on the Fahrenheit scale so far. Anyway, running several miles usually clears my head and at times the perspiration seems to bring inspiration. That was the case yesterday, which was nice because it seems like I’ve been so concentrated on selling and marketing First and Next Time that my well of creativity has been running a little dry. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m working on the sequel to First and have tried a few ideas with nothing to my liking so far. The current iteration is almost 50k words and it feels like it’s going okay, but I also have the sense it’ll need a lot more work. Plus, there’s that nagging feeling it’s not as good a story as I want it to be. About a mile into my run yesterday, the solution hit me. It was one of those aha moments, as well as a “why didn’t I think of this before?” moments. Yes, it means I totally have to rewrite half of what I’ve written so far. But it’s also going to be so much better. I’m glad a little sweat ended up providing the missing ingredient for this book. Okay, that sounds a little gross, but you get my point.