Stuck Inside of `Kato With Those Workshop Blues Again

Well, the flash was a bust, no surprise. No harm, no foul.

I've only had a few workshop experiences, and each time I always feel compelled to apologize for what I turn in. Today is no different when I turn in a story that started out as one about a preacher who wanted to save his family from an impending flood by blowing up a levee further downriver from his town...it turned into some kind of half-assed indictment of blind faith on its own with this son of a preacher going along with his father's demand that the son stay behind as the town is intentionally flooded by the Corps of Engineers. (hey, that shit really did happen in 1993 down around St. Louis).

I can see the shortcomings, but damn if I didn't feel powerless to fix them. Like, for example, why the hell do I wait four pages before introducing the town that will be saved by the flooding. In fact, I don't say anything about that town at all except it needs to be saved because of its history. And the flood of the town is declared without explaining why, and then I skimped on selling the importance of the town because I was afraid of overdetailing the story, which I am apt to do.

Guh. You know, my life would be much easier if I didn't need validation from workshop experiences. Maybe that's something to do with me being an only child....Oh! maybe I can blame my parents...that's nice an cliche, right? And remarkably untrue. Or maybe I'm too self-critical, but that's not very psycho-thearpy (or as Tobias Funke would said "analrapisty...it's pronounced uh-nal-ruh-pist". Whatever, here's the lesson I learned about the story for workshop this week:

Never write a story without a clear outline or plan. You don't know what will happen if you don't.

VIVA EL MUSTACHE!