The Novel as Mystery Meat

I just took a break from writing to pull some meat out of the freezer for supper. We are in that awkward stage of grocery shopping when most of what is left in the freezer is roast beef. I like roast beef, which is frighteningly evident from my cold storage. I've got roasts for the crockpot and roasts for the rotisserie, roasts that I could pot roast and roasts that need to be roasted. Unfortunately, I also have leftover roast in the fridge. We've eaten it a couple of times this week. I don't know how welcome it would be on the table again tonight.
So I dug a little deeper and within the distant recesses of that frosty whiteness I spied a small freezer bag. It was opaque with age, but clearly there were pieces of something inside. I was immediately thrilled, thinking by the size and shape that these might be ancient filets, long forgotten but still very good.
I was doing the happy dance all over the kitchen.
I carried the bag outside where Bill is working on the front flashing of the house.
"I think I found some filets!" I told him. "Are you up for filets?"
He walked over and looked at my bag.
"Pork chops," he said. "I think they're just pork chops."
I look at the bag more closely, and a bit disappointed.
"Okay," I said. "Do you feel like pork chops?"
"Yeah, that's fine."
I came back inside and put them in warm water to thaw. But I'll tell you, I still think they might be filets.
And right then...ta dah!...the metaphor jumped me. I don't go looking for metaphors in my life. But somehow they always seem to find me.
My writing, I realized is a lot like mystery meat.
Unlike a lot of writers that I read and admire, my stories are not really planned out in advance. Or rather there is a plan, a very simple straight-forward roast beef kind of plan, that get's thrown out quicker than a turkey neck at a vegan barbeque.
I think to myself, I want to write about a young father who feels like he never fit into his family (Last Dance at Jitterbug Lounge) or a grandmother who's not very good at taking care of her daughter's kids (Red's Hot Honkey-Tonk Bar). And the ideas seems simple and straightforward.
I have always written "from the hip," as they say. I sit down at the computer and put one word after another and that's how I work best. I guess you could say that my subconscious is a better writer than I am. I think I'm writing about fictional Jack Crabtree, swimming pool designer. But on the pages appearing before my eyes my subconscious begins to mull over long forgotten truths about my father and my uncles, my life in Oilton and bits of wisdom that I've learned, mostly through trial and error, in my life.
Writing pushes me to dig deep into my own heart, my own past, my own disappointments, my own fears. Invariably, the story that emerges is far different and more complex than I'd ever imagined. Even more that I wanted to imagine.
In writers' workshops I often tell a story about working on a book (Suburban Renewal) where the hero's father is in prison. I put him in prison at the beginning so that Sam, the hero, could be raised by his grandmother. Men who are raised by dads are often very different from those who are not. I needed this guy to be not.
Then suddenly in the middle of a scene, his father walks in.
What?!? Delete. Delete. Delete.
That was weird. I told Bill about it. Too crazy. This father was a very bad guy, very bad for my story. I wanted him out of there.
Next day, I returned to the computer and the bad dad shows up again.
Once more, I deleted him.
On day three, I decided, "Okay, I'll let this guy have a really peripheral role here."
For those of you who've read it, you know that Sam's father becomes so important in that story. He is a bad guy, but he ties the generations together and upon his character rests the entire theme of redemption possibilites available for even the worst among us.
So right now, I'm busy at work on a new book for 2010. (Red's Hot Honky-Tonk Bar is coming out this July). The 2010 book is a very concise and simply story, strictly roast beef. I could tell you all about it. But the minute I write a word here, it will definitely become some nice smothered pork chop with tasty stewed apples on the side.
Hope you're up for some grilled filets.