This script will never sell on the spec market; I think I work on it to prove to myself that I can do something whose sole impetus is creative satisfaction. I want to let a feeling be my lighthouse, guiding me towards what needs to be written rather than what, consciously-calculated, solves the equation for x. I think, with all the words I throw at getting employed in Hollywood, that this sort of thing keeps me from stagnating. I do wonder how it will turn out, if I ever actually complete a draft.

In both it and the more mercenary idea I was brainstorming, there are rites of passage for teens and young adults involved. I’ve had a couple of conversations recently about the late John Hughes – one of the pillars of his legacy was that he took the tumult of that period seriously. Ferris Bueller’s Day Off may be a fantasy lark, but look past the cute hooky antics and realize it was also, just under the surface, a suicide intervention. Ferris has a girlfriend, but the love story in that movie is with his guy friend Cameron, whose cathartic, car-destroying rage, I am certain, saves his life.

When we’re adults we look back at the big questions we had as kids and dismiss them as stupid or naive; and that’s always the challenge for a writer trying to capture that and depict them honestly. Most movie and TV children and teens act like winsome and tiny grown-ups, and the insult of it grates. It’s not done out of malice, but out of fear – that audiences will react with the same embarrassment we feel in contemplating it.

What we have to remember is that young people are on a quest to discover themselves; and at that moment, it is the most important quest of their lives. They may ask questions that we grown-ups already answered – or, possibly, simply gave up asking – but we cannot let our cynicism about our own separation from that stage of life block us from getting to know these characters. Knowing them means looking at them with unguarded eyes, and it is the first step towards loving them.

That’s a decent result, but at least on this specific script it’s probably going to slow down for the moment – I’ve reached one of the major sequences of the movie and so I’m going to have to step back from the keyboard and spend a little time with the legal pad plotting and outlining what has to get done in the next 8-10 pages, and how to get it done in a way that feels entertaining and organic.

I also spent a little time in that highly-personal script on which I work sporadically. I read through the accumulated pages the other night and surprised myself, because I forgot I had written “GOD THIS SCENE IS BORING” on top of an exposition-heavy dialogue in a cafe that I really ought to just torch. I also caught myself trying to write a Meet Cute (Screenwriting Lingo Translation: A charming or funny moment contrived to introduce two characters to each other that are destined to bond with one another somehow. Most often used in romantic comedies.) I’m getting rid of it. This script is not the place for Meet Cutes.

Actually, all this screenwriting, and that short story I finished last week, is just me taking time off from the novel. I’m going to have to transition back into that so I can finish the next chapter and trigger that payment I’ve got coming – I’m also meeting with my collaborator/patron next week, so the more work I can show, the better.

I’ve been working on a different screenplay for the last couple of evenings; one that Adam and I started as another collaboration awhile back before we ran aground at page 29. It’s not that we didn’t know what was going to happen – most of the story is outlined – we just didn’t have the same mutual fire under us that created the Football Script. It’s a fun idea, plays to our strengths, and very commercial – every industry person to whom we’ve told the idea thinks so – but when you’ve only got the last bit to motivate you, that is rarely enough; and we each had other projects that felt more creatively enticing. For these interim days, suddenly I’m finding pages for this one – we’ll have to see if he thinks they’re up to snuff.

But this is why it’s valuable to keep these half-projects at hand, along with all the notes and outlines. When you’re in a mood to write and your first-position project just isn’t moving your fingers, it doesn’t take long to get yourself back into the groove of something else. And the results can surprise. The other night I was reviewing my notes for a short story idea from three years ago, then I blinked and realized I’d typed 200 words. Again, that’s only barely something, but compared to the nights when it feels like you can’t find a single good sentence hiding anywhere in your brain, it’s an enjoyable feeling.