by Tom Mach

I was tempted to write about the easiest way not to get published. A sure-fire way of not getting published is not to write at all. [Wow! That was an easy lesson. Stayed tuned next month for Lesson 6.]

--I bet you didn’t think Lesson 5 would be that easy, did you?….

But since many of you might have already thought of not writing as an option, let’s discuss for Lesson 5 another publication blocker—procrastination. You’ve probably heard about a writer who complains about “writer’s block,” where he has paper in the printer, nicotine-stained fingers poised on his computer keys, the whining of kids in the background, his mate screaming at him about an approaching tornado--and he can’t type the first word. Reminds me of a Charlie Brown cartoon where Snoopy writes the first word of his novel (“The”), shows it to Linus, and Linus returns it to Snoopy saying “I just don’t know.” Then Snoopy gives it more thought, changes his first word to “It,” and Linus, after reading it, says “Yes, I like this beginning better.”

The point is, if you struggle like Snoopy, grasping for each word, then editing it carefully, you will probably be 1,569 years old before you finish your first draft. Unless you have special powers that allow you to live that long, you most certainly will never get published. But don’t be deceived. Procrastination is not as easy as it seems. (Excuse me while I get a cup of coffee, take the dog for a walk, look in my mailbox for more rejections, and prepare lunch.)

Where was I? Oh yes, procrastination. The trick here, if you are on a roll, is to stop typing and try to forget about what you were writing. When you return to your desk, you will then have to add new thoughts that will probably be far less effective than what you would have thought of earlier. For example, we can assume that William Shakespeare was inspired when he wrote this sonnet:

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this and this gives life to thee.

However, what if, after he wrote “all too short a date,” he recalled he really doesn’t want this poem published. So he leaves his room, goes a local pub for a brew, meets his girlfriend Madeline, who is upset with him for standing her up last night. After downing a few beers, he returns to his room, his pervious inspiration for his sonnet now completely gone, and he finishes writing. The final piece, fortunately not publishable, might read like this:

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Wow! Madeline was really hot tonight
Her complexion was nicer than gold
But then she told me to leave her sight
She would never want to see me, I am told
This summer I think I’ll date Shirley
Maybe that will get Madeline upset
That woman will be the death of me
But eternally she’ll be sorry, I bet
So long as Madeline continues with PMS
So long as I date Shirley to give it all a rest.

Be thankful when inspiration doesn’t strike you. Be happy when your story sounds more disgusting with each new sentence—something like the following:

“I love you, Paul.”

“As they say in the song,” Paul said, humming, “love is a many-splendored thing.”

The girl’s eyes brightened as she looked up from her crossword puzzle. “Oh, that’s just the word I was looking for.”

“Splendored?”

“No. Song.”

Rejoice when each sentence becomes laborious and more distasteful than the previous one. That means you are on a roll not to get published. That also means you won’t have to go to the showroom next month and be forced to make a buying decision between different models of a Mercedes. You won’t have to purchase a more expensive house and then worry about getting new furnishings. Better yet, you won’t be hounded by autograph seekers each time you dine at a restaurant.

Success. Yuk! Who needs it?

Tom can be reached at:
TomMach62@yahoo.com