Up at 4am to write as usual. It was a good day for writing. I got about 700 words written, which brought the story of David Murdoch up to his immigration to Canada, time in the States, and I am just about to cover his journey back to Canada's West and joining the RNWMP. At this juncture, it feels there is more story telling than academic prose, but first drafts can often feel like that. As Hemingway said: "The first draft of anything is shit." For many writers, they find power in this - as the title of a blog I just found indicated. Also, I like to think of first drafts as more of '0' drafts than first drafts. It then gives me hope that when I get to the first draft, I have the ingredients to create something that will not be understood. Tomorrow's work will be more about editing than it will be about writing. I've already done some of the work on Murdoch's time with the RNWMP and this will be amalgamated with that which I've been working on for the past two days. That way the first chapter of Murdoch's story will cover from his birth to the end of WWI. The second chapter will cover 1919 to 1928, which takes in his time with the RCMP to 1924, his one year with the Department of Indian Affiars and his three years with the Manitoba Provincial Police (MPP).
One nice thing about the book is that I can now envisage the whole and when that happens the completion is possible. Still, like landing an airplane, the ending is not without its hazards; and like air traffic control, a good editor proves invaluable in determining the smoothness of the landing.
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