I'm back from Oregon and am busily trying to clean the dog pee smell out of the carpet pad. At least the cat had the good graces to piss all over a blanket so we can just drop it in the washer. I also submitted some of my writing to the literary journal at UW Bothell. Sure, it's only a college publication, but at least I got off my duff and submitted something. Plus, if anything is accepted, I'll have some small sense of vindication. This campus prides itself on churning out good English and literature students and having faculty members with long publishing records. So it'd be nice to get my own work in there alongside theirs. We'll see. Like OSU, they'll probably pick the worst thing I sent for consideration.
I would like to say this though- just because I wrote some poems and have had some of them published doesn't make me a writer. I enjoy writing and have a fascination with words. I do it for myself. I don't get paid for my work. I haven't spent any time trying to get better at the craft of writing. And the odds of anything being posthumously recognized is about nil. So I'm not going to go around and call myself a writer. I think this goes for everyone else as well. Just because you took some pictures doesn't mean you're a photographer (except Marco, but that's because he's awesome). Just because you painted a picture doesn't make you an artist. And just because you have a sex tape doesn't make you a celebrity (at least it shouldn't...but it does make you a lot more popular). People get to be writers, photographers, artists, and porn stars for a reason...they believe in what they do, they are good at what they do, and they spend their lives dedicating themselves to their form of expression. It's not just a hobby. They work tirelessly at it. And they make it look easy, even though it isn't. Art is hard. So artists have to be harder. And my lazy poems and half-assed editing don't make the cut. But I like doing it anyway, so I'll keep it on my hobby list. It's a great way to beat the stress of real life.
Oh...and everyone should watch Human Footprint on the Science Channel. It's fairly impressive. It leaves some things to be desired, but is a pretty good picture of how the average American affects the planet.
1 comment:
is that journal exclusively to showcase student/staff writing, or is it open to anyone? I already got published simultaneously with Kait, I would dig the fuck out doing the same with you.
And blogging became a career mostly due to boredom-- not on the bloggers' part, but on the part of 20 million cubicle-jockeys and an equal number of college students. The internet is beautiful because 'something nominally interesting' + 'small audience' + 'google ads' = moneys. If you become part of a collective like most webcomics that brings more ad revenue, and if you sell shirts and prints and books and shit you can often make more than a full-time minimum wage job, or at least enough to feed yourself and call Wednesday morning to Monday night 'the weekend'.
I've been thinking about abandoning most of the blogs I write for. Something in me just got really tired of writing about music or books or politics for an accepted audience of none (hence the lack of updates EVERYWHERE) and I can't post any of my poems or stories online because that makes them technically (and legally) published, and therefore not submittable to most magazines. I also hate relying on other people to fill in my lazy gaps, and I'm sure the people I rely on hate the shit out of my laziness.
Instead, I was thinking of starting a solo blog-- not something that would be updated daily or that I would expect anyone to check ever, but more of a long-term public interest thing about the struggle to be a professional writer-- something that someone could look at when they're first starting and see just how quirky and frustrating the journey is. I would only update it when I have something important to say, or I got a new rejection, and what lessons came with it. It might also be nice, personally, to track the number of hours I spend in the average week working on my craft, which I do believe in, and do take very seriously, and have a vested lifelong interest in making as good as I can, and getting paid for it.
Don't know how this got so long-- you and me haven't talked in a while, homie!
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