It's done. It's finally done.

For now...

As of the time of this writing, I literally just finished my first major rewrite (Ruewrite), revision (Ruevision), and edit of my novel, Rue. It's been a months-long slog (I think I started the process in early September) but an enjoyable one, and here at the end of all things, Sam, I find myself almost as euphoric as when I finished the first draft. It truly is astounding to experience the feelings that bringing characters to life and taking them through to a satisfactory ending conjures. The feeling in my chest, deep in the middle, is akin to what I might have felt on a first date, albeit watered down. I don't know what else to say about it right now, but wow. What a feeling.

I'll write the rest of this post later, but for now, I wanted to get that feeling on paper while it's fresh.

So that was written on Wednesday evening. I had gotten out of work, my kids were busy doing some such thing, Jenelle was working on another thing, and so, with no one requiring anything from me, either explicitly or implied, I went back to the office where I had just spent eight hours (nine if you count the pre-work writing) and did more writing. I was drawn to it because I had sorted out the ending that morning before work, which left only the epilogue between me and the sweet illusion of completion. I already had a decent idea about what the epilogue needed, so I set to it with confidence and felt pretty good with where it ended up. I had to change the tone a bit and the implications even more, but hopefully, now I actually do have a satisfactory ending on my hands. Who knows if anyone else will think so, but I think I do. I’ll read it again soon and find out for sure, but for now, I’m taking a mini break from the thing.

It's now Saturday, and I'm in Cheboygan, of all places. Chevegas, as we of BadJam fame call it. Clyde is performing The Nutcracker for the final time tonight at the local Opera House. I was stunned when I walked out of the building to find that the site of at least two or three of my Chevegas performances with BadJam was literally across the street from the place. I turned back to where I had come from in disbelief, and, yep, by golly, the parking lot my car was sitting in was the same dang one where we parked our trailer all those years before and had pre-show beers around the back of it. It may have been the same parking space, and here my son is performing in the building right next to it, minus pre-show beers (hopefully).

It means a lot to me to see Clyde on stage. I've never liked dance—growing up with a dancer for a sister will give a young boy lots of material with which to bolster that opinion—and I'm not sure if it's Clyde's favorite thing either, but it's pretty clear that he loves the performing. Last weekend, he did it three times with a cough, runny nose, and a fever for all of them. He wasn't the only one, either, and if they wanted to lose half their cast, they would have sent them all home, but that wasn't going to work, so he toughed it out. We wanted him to, at least for one of the performances, because we had tickets. Life lessons right there, pal.

Again, I don't care for dance, but the moment my son walked on stage in soldier uniform, I cried. Couldn't even stop it. It hit me and didn't go away until he was off the stage again. I think it's seeing him actually do something, considering he's never been into sports or anything like that. More than that, I think it's his confidence that impresses me. I never had much in the way of confidence when I was a kid, but here's mine doing ballet, of all things. Life has a way of going the way you least expect. Sometimes that sucks, other times, it's great. This is one of the great ones.

I'm curious what he will do next. Like I said, I'm not sure if it's the actual dance that attracts him. I think it's the time with his friend Austin and the feeling of being on stage. He was pretty burnt out by the whole thing last season, but as soon as the recital came and went, he was all in again; being on stage clearly energized him. When I think about me and my guitar, it's sort of the same way. I've fallen out of love with the guitar. I'm not sure if it was ever actually love or more of a teenage infatuation, actually, but what has always remained is the love of playing music with friends and performing, or, rather, creating an environment for others to enjoy. That's what I love, and I think that's another reason why I cry when Clyde walks onto the stage. I think he might love that sort of thing, too. So, while he is following in the ballet-slippered tracks of my wife, he is also following in mine in some small way.

What does this have to do with the first paragraph of this post? Gosh, I have no idea. This is the first time I’ve split the writing of a post across several days, and I've found myself pantsing again, I guess. Let's take a sec and think about it, though, because I'm sure there's something.

**Scrolls up**

Oh, well, Clyde is finishing his Nutcracker run tonight, just like I finished the long slog of editing a book. They both took almost the same exact amount of time, and that's cool, but what else?

**Scrolls up again**

Ok, well, I guess it's that seeing Clyde on stage doing his thing is not all that different from writing a story and seeing how it turns out. The twists and turns of writing a story can be just as surprising as life. He's a story in the flesh, and I'm seeing how it turns out in real time.

I can't go back and change this one, though. I'm just along for the ride.

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