I remember when I was a kid I read somewhere about writers putting away something they’d written for a while so they could look at it later with fresh eyes. The term they used was ‘putting it in the icebox’. Although it was the seventies I had actually seen an icebox not that long before, so it was a very real image for me. Somehow the idea stuck.
I’ve been writing on and off since then, mostly on, with a bit of off when life demanded. For years I wrote mostly for use in performances. I never bothered to tell people I’d written those bits, and I think most of the time folks assumed I was riffing off the cuff. I suppose that’s a compliment to my delivery being fresh and spontaneous. Although could also mean that I never sounded like I knew what I was talking about. I’ll have to think about that.
Having been at this for a few years now, I’ve got this odd little collection of pieces, some finished, some started, some scraps, some huge chunks. I don’t look at them often, I’ve noticed that once you’ve got a body of work it’s far too easy to start thinking that your best stuff is behind you. And if that’s so in my case I’m in big trouble. So mostly I leave things be. But I’m working on this odd little tone poem and thought I remembered something from years ago. I worked my way through a bunch of stuff and found it. And that was good.
But something else happened. You see, years ago I’d started writing a long story, it was probably going to end up being novel length, although I didn’t start it out with that in mind. Somewhere along the line I started to get intimidated by the sheer volume of the thing, and more than a little doubtful about whether I was wasting my time. So I printed off what I had and showed it to a few people. And got no response. I mean none. You could hear the crickets. Ah, I figured, there’s my answer. So I dropped it. Didn’t burn it, just stopped.
Well while I was looking for the other bit for the tone poem I noticed a paper copy of the long story. So I brought it along. And later I sat down and started to read it just for the heck of it. I guess I’d been away from it long enough, it’d spent enough time in the icebox, that I had some kind of perspective on it. I was fully expecting it to be awful. Sure, I can tell it’s a first draft, but I read a few pages and started howling with laughter. Finally I said to no one there, ‘Y’know, this is actually pretty good.’
So I guess I learned two things. First, it was foolish to depend on others for support during the creative process. And also, apparently I think I’m pretty funny
And I’m not sure that’s a good thing.