In a meeting with an author and her friend this afternoon, I stated categorically that I was going to blog, that I had been meaning to blog, that I was overdue to blog, and that there was no good reason for me not to blog.

So I’ve decided to blog. The upside of this conviction is that it takes me away from rewriting a section of Secrets of a Ghostwriter I don’t feel like looking at because it entails doing some research, which means getting up from my chair and walking out of my office and actually finding the title I need to support that particular passage.

Would I ever balk at doing such a minor task if I were working on a client’s manuscript? Of course not! I get paid to complete those books. And hence, the subject of this blog: completion and its easy avoidance.

I spoke to a creative writing/critique class last week, and someone asked me how long it would take me to write a client’s novel from scratch. Without hesitation, I said, “Ten to twelve months.” Because that’s how long it would take. If it was a major work, maybe fourteen months, but  never longer. I write on deadline for my clients.

Not so for myself.

Have you ever noticed that? What we can whip out for pay we mosey along with for personal expression.

Another writer’s meeting got me to thinking about audience. Whether ghosting fiction or nonfiction for a client, I’m always aware of the potential reader. Yet, I confess, when I work on my own novels, I never give audience a first thought much less a second. I write entirely for my own enjoyment, completely for myself. I write the story I want to read — in fact, that’s why I write it, so I can read it (and not forget it).

Here’s another confession: I apparently never told the agent who first represented my first novel that it was autobiographical; I only made up one character, who turned out to be a composite of … never mind. The point is, all the other characters in the book were me.

Now she has to re-read it, she says. Hmmm.

I also haven’t told my current agent that I not only have come to realize the book will never find a publisher — it’s about three clicks past David Sedaris as far as quirky, about two clicks past Rosanne Barr grabbing her groin as far as uncomfortable (in spots), and about a click and a half past Al Franken’s Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Liar as far as outrageous — but that when my tiny little publishing company puts it out, the cover is going to be a plain brown wrapper.

This is no politically correct Pulitzer contender.

All that said, by now you must admit I’ve avoided working on that passage long enough that it’s too late for my mind to concentrate on finishing it. I’ll start again in the morning — except, of course, I have a meeting first thing and have to get in touch with somebody else — anybody else — shortly thereafter. But I will finish the rewrite. I will. Seriously. Soon.

I really mean it.