Editing Status

My untitled story (I call the 'Robert Story' for now because that's my main character) is in the process of being edited, which is almost torture for me. For many years I subscribed to the philosophy that the way I wrote it the first time is the way it was meant to be read. Five years of college later, I have seen that editing is needed for most of my work.

The story is about 75% done with the first wave of editing, which is comforting. That is until I begin the second wave of editing where I have to fatten it up without getting off-track and also find more errors.

Tonight I banged out four more pages to bring me to page 94 of 122. Now these pages are in Helvetica font, which isn't the final font for publication, so the length is shorter than usual. Official word counts should be in Courier, 12. That brings me to about 160 pages, a big difference. If I can get it to 180 or 200, I can really have a nice written work.

Sometimes I find good lines that I can't believe I have written. I don't know how they happen but I just put them on a page. While they are few and far between, it's nice to see them. I stumbled upon one tonight. It's the final sentence:

"Did you want to call him now?” Randy asked.

Anita looked up, revealing watery eyes. “I probably should but I don’t know what to even say.”

Randy handed her a tissue. “You’re a mother. You know exactly what to say.”