Twyla Tharp

You start building the wall.

You're just mixing the mortar and putting the brick in, mixing the mortar and putting the brick.

And the wall grows and it develops all of this stuff happening.

And you're just doing the mortar and the brick.

And it's very not menacing and extraordinarily rewarding in the place you want to live.

But you can't because you've got to finish the work and let it go.

A dismal moment.

The first thing is what's the idea?

The first thing is where is the story?

I mean, some writers have to know the end before they can start at the beginning.

Others want nothing to do with the end until they've at least reached the middle because they want the work to find itself.

That all is, you know, that's a part of the privilege of being a writer and the pain of being a writer.

But the construct of

Sometimes it's simply habit and discipline.

And you are going to go in and you are going to start at, let's say, 6.45 every morning and you're going to give yourself, you've only got an hour and a half, okay?

I'm not talking about you're a professional writer.

I'm talking about you're a person who maybe wants to become a professional writer, but who's got at least one other job and maybe two and probably a kid to deal with.

An hour and a half is a lot of time in that life.

So you've got to start with something.

And either there's an idea that you really are...