The Vine and the Branches

For the second week running I am starting my Mustard Seed the morning of posting. As busy as I’ve been these past two weeks, I watched a significant amount of TV. It’s research; how will I write a good screenplay if I don’t (watch) analyze a few? 
It’s difficult to reduce a 317-page novel to a two-hour script. There’s a lot of ego on each page; cutting anything is painful. This task is amplified by my ignorance of screenplay formatting. I am learning as I go, so I’m not sure when priority ought to shift from writing to learning accepted standards. Each time I try to decide, the third option, do nothing, tries very hard to sneak in.
    So where lays the Mustard Seed in this? John 15:1-10; I am pruning my story. I am taking away every branch that does not bear fruit, and every one that does I am pruning so that it bears more fruit. I must also, if I wish to meet my deadlines, prune my activities.
    As I proceed I find, not only does my story becomes better, but I understand it better. I am learning that the inspirations which became my story have more and deeper meanings than I first recognized. I found a second protagonist who journeys with the first to arrive at the same destination from a very different beginning. I think back to a haiku I wrote in second grade: 
          Walking through the mud; 
          Slish slosh, slish slosh, slish slosh, slish…
          Oops! Too deep — so long.
    I meant exactly what the poem says. Later, in high school, I submitted the poem to be analyzed by my classmates. Most of them came up with analogies that were deeper than the mud puddle. At the time, I thought the whole exercise foolish. Now I think that inspiration runs far deeper than the purpose of the artist. It is vanity to think that what we do has only the purpose we intend.
    I must end here to meet my noon deadline.
     Next week: We'll see where the Spirit takes me.
                                                                  God bless.

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