"It's only the beginning ..."

My dear, never-finished, First Act,

I sat down to write today, and my iTunes random playlist coughed up a dust-covered tune from 1991-  Deborah Conway's  It's Only the Beginning. 

It's only the beginning

But I've already gone and lost my mind

I feel like making daisy chains

And playing hide 'n' seek

When it's only the beginning

The fairy dust is still in flight

And this could be the love of a 

lifetime, even if lasts a week

Or maybe just a daydream ...

I listened to those lyrics in stunned, sweaty silence; for, my dear First Act, they could have been written for us. 

We have a toxic relationship, a sick co-dependency, you and I. Oh, I can hear you tutting beneath your breath - "How dare she watch Dr Phil when she should be writing ME!" But whatever psycho-babble label you wish to apply, it is clear that you are my addiction, my vice, and for the sake of the manuscript, not to mention my sanity, I must break free of your seductive clutches.

Oh, but you're a hard habit to break. The intoxication of finishing you for the first time is still such a sweet memory. You were complete, you were just as I had envisioned you would be, and you were perfect. The time had come for us to part. I felt a pang at letting you go, but you were strong,  you would be fine without me.

But you would not let me go. You hounded me with frantic whispers, day and night - you'd fallen apart; your meticulously woven tapestry of elegant prose now resembled a moth-eaten dish rag; your plot, once water-tight in its logic, now leaked credibility like a sieve. You would be so, so much better if only I'd come back, you sobbed. If only I'd re-write you. 

Ego stroked, I dumped poor Act Two like a hot potato and back I went. I could not ignore you - you were, after all, my first love.

So I tinkered with your opening chapters. Started in medias res, started with dialogue, started on a train, started with a fight, started in Paris, started in London, started with the villain doing his evil worst ... Every time I'd come close to finishing, convinced that this time I'd got you right and I now had the perfect beginning, you'd lay on the guilt - "Don't leave me! I'm a much better First Act when you're around. Stay, and make me perfect." So  I re-wrote you again, and again, and again, adding and subtracting scenes like a woman possessed. And maybe I was. Possessed with the notion that I must write the perfect first act before I could move on. 

But the scales have fallen from my eyes. I know now that you are my crutch; that I will never move forward if I keep working on you; that I will never finish this manuscript if I keep working on you; that I will never, ever, have to discover whether I can actually write a whole damn novel, if I kept working on you.

So I'm breaking up with you until the book is done. 

Aw, don't cry. It's not you - it's me.

You'll be fine, my brilliantly flawed First Act. You're stronger than you think. And I'll be back when it's time for revisions.

But for now, it's a definite "adieu".