Tag: Writing

  • I Make Schedules Only to Break Them

    I had made a schedule for today, and I 100% did not follow it.

    Last week was Spring Break with the kid, and all the plans got thrown out the window. For one, our car got hit while parked on the street, so it’s been in the shop since then. The loss of the vehicle killed all of our plans of getting out of the City. I had this idea that me and the kid would go disc golfing up around Beacon, and then the next day, head to a beach on Long Island. Sounds like fun and we were looking forward to it. I replaced that with going to The Strand one day, and the Museum of Natural History the next. The kid seemed fine with it.

    Anyway, with all of my time last week being spent with the kid, I knew I wasn’t going to get any work done, not that I minded. So, the start of this week, I wanted to hit the ground running. Like I said, I created a schedule for today to make sure I would be able to get everything I wanted to get done, done.

    And the day started out fine. We all got up on time, and made it to school early. I went to the gym to work out, and really got into my run. Came home from the gym, and it just went downhill. Not that it matters, honestly. I’m writing the blog in the afternoon instead of the morning. I have yet to journal, but that will be next, and I know that I won’t get to fiction today.

    BUT! I did get the laundry done, balanced the check book, did some home finance projections for the wife, took down the Easter decorations, made lunch and shopped for dinner. See, I got some shit done.

    On to the next thing

  • Not Feeling It (Unedited)

    I have been looking at this computer for an hour now, and I really can’t get anything to work.

    I thought about writing about how the Baseball season starts today, but I’m just not excited about it. In fact, there are a bunch of articles out today talking about how over blown the payrolls are for the top teams, and the whole league is skewed to the big market rich clubs. There really isn’t anything I can add to that conversation other than to say people have been making that complaint since I was a kid, so not much has really changed in thirty years.

    And it is a cold rainy day, which might be adding to my inability to focus, let alone produce something. I do set my own deadline to get something about around 11am, but I don’t always make it. It’s a guideline, not rally a hard rule. The point being to get something up to at least accomplish one thing each day. Check the box, you know, so I can say I did something.

    What I really would like to do is go back to bed. I am on my third cup of coffee, and I could doze off right now if I stopped moving and closed my eyes. That sounds nice.

    But no, I have a lunch to make for my wife, and I promised myself that I would outline a new story today. Then there is some reading to catch up on, the kid to gather from school, and a dinner to make. Somewhere in there I will play UNO with the kid, as she has become quite good at it, and I want to encourage her healthy competitive side.

    Which is to say, I’m not feeling it today.

    (I even did the stupid “button” thing that lazy essay writers do. I might even throw in some puns, which smart people claim makes you sound smart, but we all know makes you sound dumb.)

    Anyway, not feeling it…

  • Rejection

    Tuesday morning is when I go grocery shopping for my family. This chore takes me out of Harlem and to the 93rd Street Trader Joe’s, which means if I do this right, it will take me an hour to do. I listen to music, and read on the subway. It’s personal time for me, so I try to keep it to enjoying things that make me feel better.

    I read on the subway trip down, and had a nice stroll through the UWS to get to the store. Shopping was fine, not too many people. When I got to checking out, I was going to use my phone to tap and pay, when I saw on my screen that I had got an email from a magazine I had submitted a story to.

    Curiosity got the better of me, and I opened the email, knowing that I already knew what the response was going to be, but I still wanted to see it. They were rejecting my story. Like I said, I had a feeling a knew what the response would be. But, clearly I must have looked disappointed, as the woman ringing me up asked, “You okay?”

    I guess I did get my hopes up.

    Even though I told myself not to. Funny how even though I prepare myself for this, I still set myself up. Oh well. I have to come to love every step of the process, even the ugly soul crushing parts.

    I was a theatre major in college, and I had a professor who would say that to us, that you had to enjoy all the steps in the process of becoming a professional, which, according to him, is the only way you will be able to survive the ups and downs of a career in the arts.

    I always thought that advice was bullshit. Who the hell likes being rejected?

    No one likes being rejected.

    But I can see his point. To get accepted, you got to put yourself out there. The more you can enjoy getting out there, the less the rejection stings.

    Well, four down, one more to go, and that will complete my first round of submissions. Then I have to go find another set of magazines to submit to.

    Process keeps on going.

  • Not Enough Time

    I am stealing a moment to type this out. I didn’t do my homework last night. My homework being to make a meal plan for the week, a grocery list, and writing a blog to be posted this morning. What I did was binge three episodes of Ted Lasso with my wife, and then fell asleep on the couch.

    So, now I am running behind. I still have to do the aforementioned tasks, but I also have to take the kid to her dentist appointment later today. As this is titled, I don’t have enough time to get everything done.

    And I had two really great ideas for a blog. One was about showing how over the past 30 years homage, parody, and ripping-off in media have become blurred. The other was how I was completely judgmental toward guys who work out all the time at the gym. Both I thought were great ideas.

    But now I have to go.

    Maybe I’ll get to it later in the week.

  • Where I’m At

    I got rejected from another lit magazine yesterday. I submitted to five at the end of January/beginning of February. That would be three rejections in the past two weeks. I am expecting to be rejected by the final two magazines, and then we will start this whole process over again.

    I am reminding myself that everyone I know who has a successful career in the arts had to put in about ten years of ground work first. The other thing that comes to mind is what my dad told me about achieving a goal; you get 100 no’s before the first yes, so get the no’s out of the way. So, 97 more no’s to go.

    Now that I have the self-affirmation shit out of the way, I think I’m going to subscribe to “The Drift” today. It’s a quarterly lit mag, written by people who are younger than me. I mean, not that much younger, but still, I have a few years on them. Anyway, I feel the need to discover some new ideas.

    I have been able to get back to reading regularly, and I am making headway through “The Stories of John Cheever.” I still have “60 Stories” by Donald Barthelme that I seem to have been working on for five years, but I am feeling like 2022 is the year it will be finished. Furthermore, I feel like I will be making a trip down to The Strand soon, and see what I can find.

    Yeah. That’s where I’m at.