The Joy of Cooking

After a hard slog on my book this afternoon, rustling up some Fettuccine Alfredo was relaxing. I’ve never been into cooking that much. But for the last few weeks I’ve enjoyed it—mainly because it’s something I know I can do and it gives my family pleasure—most of the time anyway.
While I was cooking I thought about what challenge writing really is. Probably not a good thing for someone who has written so many articles to admit. You’d think I could do it with my eyes closed by now, but I don’t find it gets any easier. Writing is all about thinking, and you really have to concentrate.
Rewriting my book is proving to be harder than writing it. Today I felt like I was working on something separate from myself. The book seems to have taken on a life of its own, pushing me to go deeper, be clearer, make it better. (And here I thought I’d just be doing a house clean).
Now that I’ve passed the halfway point, I realize that it’s going to take me longer than I thought. So much for schedules and goals. I read something the day about the Apollo space missions. Apparently they were only on course a fraction of the time, and those forays into space were all about trying to get back on track. I guess inner travels involve much the same thing.