1 year into draft 3
Mar. 4th, 2026 07:18 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gs_silvaAgainst my better judgment, I ventured a peek at Facebook this morning, and it was kind to me - it greeted me with this memory.
It's a panel from the last page of my graphic novel. The wedding is over, some drama was resolved, and Cathy and Maurice take a stroll with Ren to watch the sun rising over the Saône River.
Maurice is saying, "Je suis fini!" Which means "I'm finished" in more of a mortal peril context.
Cathy corrects him: "Non, j'ai fini! Heeheehee!"
It's my announcement of completion of the webcomic, which is also Draft 2 of the graphic novel. That's not the actual dialogue. The good thing about putting my dialogue in digitally is that I can change it all I want, and so I make memes out of my own art on a regular basis, because then I can just change it back to what it was afterwards. I also do endless rewrites. Creating a graphic novel has forced me to learn brevity, and to allow much of the storytelling to appear in the art. For those who can spend time examining the art, there's a layered and complex story in there with lots of additional character development and setting. For those who can't see the art, there's still a lot of story to be had. It turns out I'm not very good at brevity.
But what really hits me about this 1-year anniversary is that it means I've already been working on Draft 3 for a year.
Oh no.
***
ETA: I looked at other posts I made that day, and it was Mardi Gras, so I asked my FB list, "What are you giving up for the Trump Administration?" (A reference to giving things up for Lent, for those of you who are not from a Lent practicing tradition.) And then I wrote a long list of things I expected to lose in the coming years. One year later, yup, most or all of them have come about. I could even add some.
It's a panel from the last page of my graphic novel. The wedding is over, some drama was resolved, and Cathy and Maurice take a stroll with Ren to watch the sun rising over the Saône River.
Maurice is saying, "Je suis fini!" Which means "I'm finished" in more of a mortal peril context.
Cathy corrects him: "Non, j'ai fini! Heeheehee!"
It's my announcement of completion of the webcomic, which is also Draft 2 of the graphic novel. That's not the actual dialogue. The good thing about putting my dialogue in digitally is that I can change it all I want, and so I make memes out of my own art on a regular basis, because then I can just change it back to what it was afterwards. I also do endless rewrites. Creating a graphic novel has forced me to learn brevity, and to allow much of the storytelling to appear in the art. For those who can spend time examining the art, there's a layered and complex story in there with lots of additional character development and setting. For those who can't see the art, there's still a lot of story to be had. It turns out I'm not very good at brevity.
But what really hits me about this 1-year anniversary is that it means I've already been working on Draft 3 for a year.
Oh no.
***
ETA: I looked at other posts I made that day, and it was Mardi Gras, so I asked my FB list, "What are you giving up for the Trump Administration?" (A reference to giving things up for Lent, for those of you who are not from a Lent practicing tradition.) And then I wrote a long list of things I expected to lose in the coming years. One year later, yup, most or all of them have come about. I could even add some.