It must be the season. I wonder about a certain rhythm to my work. I often find myself deep within the creative process. At this moment, the wave of enthusiasm that I am riding comes crashing down. All of the sentences that I have painstakingly put down on paper suddenly seem downright ugly. Those sentences and the words that comprise them have sprung from the hand of an ogre. It sometimes even goes further than that. The very letters themselves feel – at a visceral level – odious. I have the pressing urge to fix everything. I cannot stomach the thought of allowing those sentences to remain on the page. They must be written over, with words that are more sonorous. I want to put up a seawall against the rising tide of ugliness.

I have learned that this moment is part of the natural rhythm of the creative endeavor, even though it shocks me each and every time. I am not sure why it has to be this way. Can’t I just have a pleasant enough time with the words, write down a few pleasing-sounding phrases and call it a day?

At this moment, I know enough to call it quits. I have to stop for the day. I have to set down the pen, turn off the desk lamp and walk away into the dark. Tomorrow is another day.

I can just imagine how this moment must feel for a visual artist – to careen back from the canvas or the tower of clay – and to be horrified with all the ugliness that you have created. The horror is confronting you on a far grander scale than the confines of a piece of paper.

But it never fails to amaze me that the very next morning those words and the sentences they construct don’t look so terrible. In fact, they are not as rotten as I had imagined over the course of the night. It had become the source of nightmares. But now, with the light of day, those letters feel comforting. They have endured enough to take on an impression of just-so-ness (if that is even a word – with a nod to Kipling here). Those sentences are not half bad.