Six Years Later

Six years ago I started writing a novel.

Today I finished editing it.

There are still little things to tweak, of course. Edging closer—always—to a more apt word. Tracking down that comma that will try and betray me somewhere.

But the book is done.

And my god, when I tell you life has been lifing through all 12 drafts, I mean it:

• Covid

• A divorce

• More therapy than I expected

• Job loss

• Moving countries

• Walking away from writing entirely

• Even more therapy

• My dog dying

• And eventually...finding my way back to the page

The first thing I did when I finished this morning was to take a shower. Standing there, under the water, it hit me just how many versions of me it took to get this book done.

This is the part we don’t talk about often enough. All the tests that come with trying to build something meaningful. I lost track of all the moments where it would have been easier to stop (and for a while, I did).

Getting here was littered with extinction points, barely avoided.

For anybody working toward something you care about, anything at all, keep going. Sometimes the person who starts the dream isn’t the one who gets to finish it.

P.S. if you’re curious about the book, I’m posting the first part on my other Substack:

The Art of Killing Gods - Prologue