#199 Painting The Picture

This last weekend my brother drove with me to Tyler, TX to help me paint the inside of a house I lived in several years ago and now rent out.  We removed old nails, taped the base boards, cleaned the walls, and laid down paper and canvas to protect the cheap laminate that covers the bedroom floors.  Then the painting began.

This was my brother's first time to paint.  He stood at the wall with a dripping roll brush and said, "Is that good?"  I looked at the cream-colored streak of paint slashed across the wall.  I compared it to the smooth and organized strokes on my side that covered 1/4 of the wall.  I said, "We're trying to paint the whole wall evenly.  So take a look at your streak, and make it look even and clean."  He scratched his head and eyed his brush.  He rolled over the messy streak a second time and said, "How about now?  Is that good?"

My brother recently finished college and is interested in becoming a working writer.  We talk every week about our stories, and our conversations inspire many of my posts on writing.  He wants to write comic books, movies, and short stories.  This last weekend, while we drove lonely 2-lane highways through East Texas, he asked me, "What's a novella."  After hearing my basic and underwhelming definition (amounting pretty much to "it's like a novel...only shorter") he said, "I want to write one of those!"

But my brother has one problem.  He rarely finishes what he starts.  He has dozens of half-written comic books, a handful of short stories and he is working on a novella.  But none of them are finished.  None of them are ready to be released into the world.

I used to think this was a problem of persistence.  I envisioned fleeting moments of inspiration that led him to his computer for an hour or so, where he would pound out a page here or some thoughts on a new comic book there.  I thought he lacked the conviction to finish his projects because one flash of inspiration could only take him so far.

I'm not sure that's true anymore.  When he stood at the unpainted wall, he had no idea what the finished product was to look like.  He hadn't thought it through.  He was not invested.  For him, he was helping his brother paint a house.  So he put paint on the wall and asked me if it was good.  I think this is what's happening with his stories.  He wants to write them.  He doesn't mind the work.  But I don't think he has a clear idea of what he wants his finished product to look like.  Without a clear ending goal, his project bogs down and he starts something else.

I wonder how many other writers bog down.  Do they lack persistence?  Or do they lack a clear vision?  This is a good thing to think about before embarking on a large project.  An interesting premise and a bottle of wine may not be enough to carry you through to a finished product.  It's important to know what you want the wall to look like before start painting it.