Days of Joy

In the last few weeks I have lived immersed in the manuscript, doubting every line, every paragraph, and preparing it for March, for my editor’s eyes. It is a strange time, at once exhausting and deeply meaningful.

Rewriting means looking at every sentence and asking: Is this the truest version of the story I can tell right now? Now that I have lived my days with them inside the AX, I know them better. I love them, if possible, even more.

Some days it feels like sanding wood and smoothing edges that probably no one will ever notice. Other days I am a surgeon. I cut and stitch the parts I love most, and sometimes I remove them with a little pain because they create only background noise. I read every paragraph out loud, which in English and with my pronunciation, thankfully I do when I’m alone. I check the rhythm and the repetitions. I try to understand where the emotion needs more space, and where instead it is already too much.

Reaching March knowing I have given this book everything I had, in this moment of my life, of my writing, of who I am.

And in this slow and meticulous work, I thrive, because the hardest part of building the story is behind me, and now the greatest joy is shaping it into its best form.

These are days of joy.