The book that must leave home

This is the probably 100th time I've read through this one particular book I've written. I don't even know when I first wrote it, it's been so long. The characters have been a part of my life, my family, for so many years. They are composites of many different people with the exception of the main character: I saw him on the beach on Martha's Vineyard a long, long time ago. He was there for a few consecutive summers; then he probably grew up and no longer needed a summer job hanging at the beach.

But he lives on in my mind, as real as he really isn't. I have no idea who he is. He was a teenager who happened to catch my eye. His job was to sit on the beach and be a presence; to tell people not to touch the clay cliffs or answer questions. He wasn't a lifeguard. While I sat in my beach chair, one eye watching the kids swim in the surf, another on a book, I saw him. He was kicking a soccer ball into the ocean. And it would bob around in the waves a bit, then eventually come back to the beach on a wave. He would trot down the beach to where it rolled out, and do a few fancy moves before kicking it back in.

I was mesmerized.

The boy was beautiful. He had gorgeous blonde hair that was really curly. He was tanned, blue-eyed and muscular. His mother came to hang out with him sometimes, with his sisters. The entire family was movie star gorgeous; I couldn't keep my eyes off of them.

The book centered around him wrote itself between that summer and the next. My mother was reading it on that beach when he walked by. I pointed him out and told her that he was my muse.

I literally regurgitate a book. It spews out of me and the only thing that slows me down is that I can't type as fast as it comes. I live and breathe the book until it is over. I don't sleep and huge gaps of time are lost as I promise a child I will help with homework when they get home from school, only to realize that the sun is about to come up and I haven't even realized that not only have I not honored that promise, I didn't even notice when they went to bed.

It's kind of scary, really, how sucked in I get. And because it's really nothing short of detrimental to family life; I tend to avoid it. And the best way to do that is to not write a book, but continue to "edit" the one that I wrote so long ago. I have three other books going; but I have to ignore them, because I lose all touch with reality.

Of course, I have tried to be moderate about it! I have tried to walk away after 8 hours of solid writing and engage myself in some other activity. But it is hopeless. My brain is completely locked up in another world, with other people and conversations and plot potentials.

It seems like such a cop-out; to say that I can't write because it is too much fun! Too wonderful, too mind-consuming and like floating in the ocean and staring up at the sun. It brings me that much pleasure and peace. It is who I am. Or do I use it to escape?

I have no idea.

But I love this book -- I love the characters, and I can see them developing and becoming more of themselves with each time I go through and "edit." I put it in quotes because it's more than editing. It's revisiting and re-addressing the decisions I've made -- but which can be changed with a few paragraph modifications. Lucy, the main character, is so ridiculous not to see that right before her is true love, in more than one occasion. She steadfastly and resolutely believes that she is in love with Ethan (my beach boy with the soccer ball). Sometimes I wonder if that dedication is due to the fact that while he was the seed to a book idea, he eventually became a lesser character. Did Lucy hold on to him for way longer than she would have because of me?

I love one of the characters that Lucy doesn't see clearly; and how does that get in the way of Lucy's story? It concerns me at times that I get TOO involved (gee, what makes you think that?!!! LOL) and then somehow the core of the original story gets tainted.

Just before I switched to blogging I was about to make a monumental change to the book. Based on the fact that **I** wanted it to go another way. Not the way Lucy would choose. I know Lucy wouldn't. She doesn't have the strength yet. So I am trying to write myself away from making such a drastic decision; try to figure out why I don't just let this book GO!

I am not Lucy. I think that everyone thinks that you are the main character of a book that you write. And it's not a ridiculous conclusion. But Lucy drives me nuts. I can't STAND her choices. But Lucy comes from me, right? What part of Lucy am I? (These questions are all rhetorical, I am just typing as quickly as I can, in an attempt to get away from the urge to change the course of the book by making one monumental change.)

I won't do it! I won't!

I am going to take a cold shower. Shock my system; seek clarity. Understand that the blockages are breaking wide open and it is the flow that writing creates in my life making everything bigger. More.

Let Lucy go.

Just let go.