Workin' on my slapshot

I envy those people who go to work and do a job and at the end of the day have tangible results. Maybe it's receipts of items sold. Maybe it's a harvest. Maybe it's grades earned by students. Maybe it's patients cared for. Maybe it's widgets made.

When I go to work (and I'm not talking teaching here, I consider that one job, and I consider writing another job) and do my job I rarely have tangible results. I feel a little like what the philosophers must have felt like back in the day. If you watch The Big Bang Theory (and you really really should if you don't) you'll remember the sequence in this week's episode where Sheldon and Raj worked - basically they stood around and stared at equations for days on end. That's often what I do.

I've been working on my current screenplay since February. Technically, if you count the Final Draft document files, I'm on draft eight. But in reality, this draft is probably somewhere in the hundreds. I write and I change and I move and I rewrite. And then often I sit and stare. I did that for a good portion of today.

I have a good draft done. Angela thinks it's good. I think it's the best yet. People ask me when I'm going to send it out to producers and managers and anyone who'll accept an email attachment. And I stop dead in my tracks. It's not ready to go out yet. Not at all.

I'm not one of those people who thinks her work is precious. I know it is. It's precious to me. But I also know it's not sacred. I know that once I put it out into the world it is no longer my own. That begins when I show it to a friend or family member to read. That begins the second the words print out of the printer. Communication is as much about the receiver as it is the sender. It's not all about how I intend the message, it's about how you receive it.

So I have this draft. This draft that has taken almost eight months to come into being. This draft that changed quite a bit after a hard core plot session with Angela on Saturday afternoon. This draft that has jokes I love and is missing jokes I adore. This draft is good but not excellent.

So today I made a note card for every single scene in my film. I charted the entire plot. I wrote fifteen incantations of a logline before I came up with a simple sentence that defines my story. I went over notes from a whole year of study at UCLA. I went over notes from books and reels of movies stored in my mind.

And I realized two things. One, I have some work to do. But two, I can do it. Am I scared? Of course. Out of my mind. I cannot imagine sending someone my screenplay, these characters I have birthed, this world I have created, these words I have agonized over, and have them rip it to shreds. I cannot imagine having someone reject it as I know it will be. But I've also realized something else. I have to do this. I have to because it's my job. It's me.

I don't get paid to sit and stare at note cards for six hours on a rainy Wednesday afternoon. I don't get paid to come up with countless spec ideas for an episode of Bones. Yes, there are people who do get paid to do these things and I pray that one day, I will be among that group but guess what? I do it already, for free, because I have to. It's who I am. It's what I am.

Every time I think about giving up or wishing it was easier I think about athletes who spend countless hours training to get where they are. That's what I'm doing. I'm training. I'm trying to make my game the best it can be before I get in front of all those scouts. Because no one's going to pick me if I can't make free throws or get the puck to the net. And I really really really wanna be picked.