the most stubborn writer alive

"You should just skip that part," my husband says.



"I can't. You know I can't. I'm not like that."



"You should try," he says, "because you're driving yourself crazy."



"I know," I say. "But I can't."



Why is it that I work this way, I wonder—incapable of writing forward when the scene I've been working on fails? Incapable of believing that I'll get it right some time. Now is the time, and now I am failing. The failure of the scene is the failure of the book until—unless—I get it right.



I'll be crazy between now and then.