Darning the Holes

Today I watched my daughter darn a hole in my favorite pair of socks--the ones she'd hand knitted and given me for my birthday last year. I didn't tell her for a very long time that a hole had mysteriously appeared them. She'd spent so much time creating them, and they were beautiful--the envy of all my friends. How could I tell her they were ruined?

When I finally broke the news about two weeks ago, she told me not to worry, that she could fix them. Fix them? You mean they aren't ruined? She assured me she could do it. And she did. The fix is solid and invisible. Her skill is amazing and inspiring to me.

Then I thought about it and how we writers do the same thing. We write our stories, spilling out the words, weaving them creatively until we write THE END. The stack of paper several inches high gives us a great sense of accomplishment and happiness. Our creation is finished. We've created a wonderful piece of fiction, one that is close to our heart.

We send it off to agents and publishers, praying they will love our creation. Then we learn that inside our manuscript there may be a flaw. A small imperfection that if "tweaked" will make the manuscript publishable. Our creation has a hole.


Can it be fixed invisibly? Can it be salvaged? We worry and fret, and then reassess the flaw. We look at it carefully, looking for broken threads. We hone in on the weak spots.

Then we pick up our pens and begin to craft. We reknit the words. We weave in the loose ends of our plots and subplots. We close up the holes.

We have become darners. Isn't life wonderful?