AWAITING AN EPIPHANY

Have you ever noticed there are some words that you find especially cool?  Maybe you like their meaning, or how they sound, or what they feel like rolling off your tongue—whatever.  For me, it’s the word epiphany.  I didn’t always use this word, especially for years, because I could never spell it right.  In the old days before word processors and spell-check, if I couldn’t spell a word I wouldn’t use it.  I was too lazy to look it up in the dictionary.  Then too, I was such a poor speller I would often get caught in that catch-22 trap of not being able to look up a word I didn’t know how to spell because…I didn’t know how to spell it.

Now, just for grins, here is what you get in Word when you shade the word epiphany and click on look-up:  “…a sudden intuitive leap of understanding, especially through an ordinary but striking occurrence.”  I personally define the word as “a holy crap moment.”

The reason I bring this up—the word epiphany—is because I’ve been waiting for one for several days.  They are not known for coming along often.  In fact, if you are actively thinking about one coming along, it more than likely won’t.  So why am I waiting for one?  It’s this damn book I’m writing. I mentioned it in a previous posting.  This book, my third novel, is proving to be a writer’s nightmare.  I have the beginning and the end, sort of.  I don’t have three or four chapters in the middle.  I just left some blank pages.  I can’t wait for them to fill themselves up with meaningful content, so I decided I’d just come back to them later.  Meanwhile, I kept going and wrote the last segment of the book.  But it’s all kind of flat.

“Compelling” is another word I like.  I like my books to be compelling.  If they don’t motivate you to keep reading, then why continue reading?   I like what I’ve written for this new book, at least as a first draft, but it’s not very compelling.  It needs a holy crap moment and, so far, I haven’t come up with any crap that’s holy enough.  So I’ve been waiting for an epiphany. That’s what I told my wife when she asked me why I was standing against the railing of the loft upstairs.  I told her I was waiting for the epiphany that would finally put a “WOW!” in my book.  She told me epiphanies don’t stop in the loft anymore, that I should maybe walk on over to the bathroom and wait there for one.

I am not sure what to do.  I checked outside in the bushes for an epiphany.  I looked under the seats of the car. I even thought I’d go over to the supermarket because maybe they had a sale on epiphanies.  My supermarket has a lot of buy one/get one free sales each week.  But good thing I checked the weekly sales booklet and didn’t waste a trip over there.  Then, in a moment of desperation, I checked Craig’s List but there wasn’t even one epiphany listed.

So I guess I will just have to be patient some more. I know it will come eventually.  It’s just being stubborn.  Epiphanies can be that way.  Maybe I can force one out in the open if I come up with some ordinary but striking occurrence.  Hmmm, I wonder…where do I find one of those?

*****

Speaking of holy things, right about here is holy space. This is where I list the names of the nice people who recently stopped by my blog and took a gander (please remember to return it; there are only so many)…they are: Ron Carmean, Mike Fuller, Peter Bolger, Ben East, Margie of Curating Serendipity, and psychologistmimi.  Thank you!