100 Words Per Mile: Wanting to Be Indestructible

A few weeks in to becoming a dad, I ponder whether to push or preserve myself.

November 10, 2021
6.20 miles
49:42

I’ve been thinking about this pandemic-baseball novel I drafted in 2018 and the kind of dread that fueled that book. I don’t know that I’m capable of feeling that kind of dread ever again. If I hadn’t written that novel when I did, I don’t think it would have ever been written. This is bizarre to think about, but it’s an artistic philosophy that can get a little metaphysical.

In short, this is what I believe: the words I write today could only have been the way they are written today. Any other day, I will bring something else to the page with me, ultimately influencing the the rhythm of my sentences, word choice, tone, mood, genre interests.

In long, there are infinite versions of the work we create, well before we even get into the editing/revision process. Similar to string theory, or whatever the “multiverse” is, every time we decide to write or not to write, we’re choosing a different version of whatever story we’re telling.

This isn’t unlike my wife and I’s struggles with infertility. Our daughter was born almost four years to the day from when we miscarried. Who knows who that child would’ve been, what kind of parents we might’ve become. Four years is a long time, especially when you’re measuring your late twenties to early thirties.