Oh, the Power

What wonderful. god-like powers the writer possesses!  How amazing is it to be able, when some plot point becomes necessary to the continuation of the story, to be able to put it in place and then reach back down the time line of your work and insert the words and sentences that will make that plot point fit seemlessly into the suspended disbelief of the future readers.

The painter will need to paint over existing brush work to add some item or structure to support the new idea, and the sketcher will perhaps combine the eraser with overdrawing - but the underlying original marks are still there for the sharp-eyed. 

The writer can miraculously delete, cut and paste, copy and paste, and insert, at will.  If she is careful, those future readers will never detect even the faintest clue that the author was at any time less than omniscient.  As a child, I took from the instructions of my teachers the idea that somehow the words flowing onto the page had to be the words that would be there for the reader.  It was some time before I understood that was not the case - that I could write what I pleased, and screw it up and use only a few words or sentences from that page to start anew on a clean sheet.

Now I revel in that power - my pen can charge along a line of narrative or conversation as it flows from brain to nerves to fingers to ink, never pausing until it is done.  I can worry about the fine detail, the justifications, the cause and effect, the wit and humour, the pathos and tears, and the believability, later - because I have The Power to Amend, Insert, or Erase, and I'm not afraid to use it.