Draft 15
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| Draft1 |
Happens all the time. I read Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell and declared it The Most True and Authentic Teen Love Story For All-Time- plaque at engraver's- and passed it off to many a good friend with the promise that it is A Great Love Story. Many agreed with me, possibly under duress as I glowered at them from above the book's edge and then my friend, Chelsea, told me it's awful. She wanted everything to work out on the page; the ending was too open and ambiguous. For her, there were too many ways for things not to work out where that particular story ends. For her, that wasn't a love story but a tragedy. All the reasons Chelsea was mad about the book happened to be why I loved it. This perfect love story for me wasn't for her. Repeat this scenario with my sister and A Tale of Two Cities. For her it was overwrought, overworded (not an actual word, but you get it), and overly tragic. For me, it was the best of love stories in the worst of ways. What was beautiful to me was rubbish to her. Happens all the time.
Here's why: love stories are hard. If Chelsea and Carrie (and if them then there are others with these unfortunate views) don't fall under the spell of these two love stories, then there must be other, better examples of words to encompass and harness this thing that is near-impossible to manufacture but simple enough to fall into. Right? Thornbirds? No, that seems like a poor choice - or poor choice upon poor choice upon poor choice rather. Wuthering Heights? Ugh, if the scenery is as dark and brooding as one of our protagonists then we have a problem. Maybe move off the moor and get some sun in your life, man. The Last of the Mohicans? Too much senseless death. Jack and Rose on the Titanic?* Obviously not. Love means never having to die of hypothermia when someone could just MOVE OVER ON THE FLOATING PIECE OF PIANO! Romeo and Juliet? Oh swear not by the pull of teenage lust and heedless rebellion. There is too much tragedy (not enough prefrontal cortex) and too little actual love (not enough life experience for heaven's sake!) in that runaway train of pride and short-sightedness. If the Immortal Bard biffed that hard on a love story what, then, are we mere mortals to look toward as exemplars of true love?
I suppose the difficulty in pinning down a perfect love story is that love happens to be just as unique as the individuals who find themselves in it. Love *is* a many splendored thing because the participants are many splendored beings. And that makes it hard to really nail the landing on a story that appeals to all. So thank goodness we don't have to keep the versions we have read in books or even experienced in our own day-to-day if that's not the version that suits us best. Praise be to the rough draft! In the love stories of our own lives, we can edit prodigiously. With care, we can write and re-write and amend and expand and strengthen our love stories. They are a work in progress so long as we are. That is the big reveal: we can keep writing if we'd like. We don't have to be perfect the first go-round of anything, especially not the first go-round on something as amorphous and ineffable as love.
Sean and I are currently working on Draft 15 of our particular story. In Draft 1, Sean went away. I cared little for that. In Draft 3, Sweet Girl was introduced upon the stage and the stage has never been the same. We thought our love story was the two of us and then it was the three of us. In Draft 4, we built the House of Many Felled Pine Trees. Twas lovely, so of course the Army would move us. In Draft 6, the three of us became the four of us and the four of us moved - when Little Man was the littlest - to a new state just in time for Sean to be away again. I cared so little for that version that I struggled to care for myself. If there ever was a love story it is written by those who love their people even as their people can't love themselves. So I kept my sights on Draft 7 and 8 when we moved again. Those drafts saw the four of us mostly together, and happier times prevailed. In Draft 11, we found a home. In all these drafts Sweet Girl and Little Man continued to re-write the definition of unconditional love for us. They still do; they're workaholics as such. In many drafts we suffered great losses. In every draft we counted ourselves as lucky. Drafts 1-15 have taught more than we asked them to and enlightened us to how much we don't know. The setting has changed, characters have come and gone, plot twists abound, and yet we remain. Another draft means another chance to get it right for us. Praise be to the rough drafts that got us here and may we draft many more. There is love yet to write.
*I am aware this is not a book but it needed to be addressed.
I suppose the difficulty in pinning down a perfect love story is that love happens to be just as unique as the individuals who find themselves in it. Love *is* a many splendored thing because the participants are many splendored beings. And that makes it hard to really nail the landing on a story that appeals to all. So thank goodness we don't have to keep the versions we have read in books or even experienced in our own day-to-day if that's not the version that suits us best. Praise be to the rough draft! In the love stories of our own lives, we can edit prodigiously. With care, we can write and re-write and amend and expand and strengthen our love stories. They are a work in progress so long as we are. That is the big reveal: we can keep writing if we'd like. We don't have to be perfect the first go-round of anything, especially not the first go-round on something as amorphous and ineffable as love.
Sean and I are currently working on Draft 15 of our particular story. In Draft 1, Sean went away. I cared little for that. In Draft 3, Sweet Girl was introduced upon the stage and the stage has never been the same. We thought our love story was the two of us and then it was the three of us. In Draft 4, we built the House of Many Felled Pine Trees. Twas lovely, so of course the Army would move us. In Draft 6, the three of us became the four of us and the four of us moved - when Little Man was the littlest - to a new state just in time for Sean to be away again. I cared so little for that version that I struggled to care for myself. If there ever was a love story it is written by those who love their people even as their people can't love themselves. So I kept my sights on Draft 7 and 8 when we moved again. Those drafts saw the four of us mostly together, and happier times prevailed. In Draft 11, we found a home. In all these drafts Sweet Girl and Little Man continued to re-write the definition of unconditional love for us. They still do; they're workaholics as such. In many drafts we suffered great losses. In every draft we counted ourselves as lucky. Drafts 1-15 have taught more than we asked them to and enlightened us to how much we don't know. The setting has changed, characters have come and gone, plot twists abound, and yet we remain. Another draft means another chance to get it right for us. Praise be to the rough drafts that got us here and may we draft many more. There is love yet to write.
*I am aware this is not a book but it needed to be addressed.
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