If you want to have “the time of your life” watch Dirty Dancing… Also avoid becoming a writer

Suuuuuuuure, B

Writing is fun! For like FIVE minutes. But after some time on a novel, like real time and not a monthish period of excited word vomit where you splurge your every thought into 200 pages like you have the flu – you suddenly see the sinister black lining.

Sometimes it makes you so high you can write a million pages and then jog five miles in glee singing “Weeeee are the champions my freee – eeends!”. While other lower moments you wanna take that same five mile jog off a quarter mile cliff.

You are told to write with your heart and so you do. Like an idiot. THEN someone comes along and says you need surgery cause your heart is really really lame, boring, it sucks, what a floppy heart. (Will somebody PLEASE get me a thesaurus)

So we come to lesson number one of my made up lessons that I made up and are also mine: People are full of crap.

Yup.

Especially writers.

Pure unadulterated crap. Cuuuurrraaaaap.

Your friends and their attempts to cheer you? Crap. Your family and their flip little comments “Gee hun, that’s nice.” having no clue how much time you spent on an idea they just brushed off to tell you about this one time at band camp when they thought about writing… Like I said… Crap. Bookfacers? Crap. That guy at the store who you accidentally told you were an author to who spent five minutes of your life explaining his book and how he is going to write it “someday”. TOTAL CRAP!

Don’t get me started on editors who make you suddenly act like the staff holding Gandolf “You shall not pass!”. They give you “rules” about how to start a book, cut it back, add to it, and is this a “dream sequence”???? So last year! You can’t use prose like that! You need to stop trying to be so colorful. Stop being so blunt, blah blah blah, are you listening to me, Logan? Why do you have that look on your face? Is that— Is THAT A GUN!

And what is WITH this “muse thing”? You see everyone running around showing “muse” pictures. Little sexy muse guys and gals all dolled up, some with little quotes, “Hey there sexy girl. Write me a story and I’ll strip.” Or maybe that was just Sidda?
Anyway, CRAP!

Giving ideas to “jog” the muse as if he/she were Best in Show (Ha! John I stole that from ya.) When in reality YOUR situation is a bit closer to the Predator and YOUR muse slathers mud across their body Schwarzenegger style to stay away from you… With that same lovely stilted dialogue.

“But Logan, life is like a box of chocolates!”

No it ain’t you made up voice from one of my made up fans. It’s a box of dynamite. Add in some bits of cyanide for a slow death… but the poison tastes like chocolate. (nods)

Look. You wanna talk Tom Hanks? Fine.

Think less about Forest Gump and his magic shooo-oooeees and think more about Cast Away.

Yeah, uh huh. YOU are on an Island. No matter HOW much help you think you are getting YOU have to write, fix, make, create, be sick, feel good, cry, bleed, through this BY YOURself.

You WILL think you are losing your mind in the first few months. You WILL actually lose it by a year. And you will not even know you have lost a thing by three.
You WILL befriend inanimate objects like Tom. Talk to yourself, use prose in and out of dialogue, and become “Wordy” (thanks Sunniva;))

You WILL lose faith in your “friend” and throw Wilson into the ocean.

“Willllllllllllsooooooooooon! Willllllllllllsoooooooooooon!” I still tear up every time.

Then you will get him back and say you are sorry and never ever piss him off again. Ever. (Looks lovingly at her own beach ball. What? They were out of soccer stuff, it’s seasonal…)

Look. (Where is Alianne at? I mean I’ve used “look” like twice in a paragraph!) Look<<< (three!).

This marriage between you and your story is less Romeo and Juliet… Wait… No… It is EXACTLY that. Everyone dies at the end…

For you young ones needing a contemporary setting: Sexy young couple goes out, she shaves her legs, he gives her the good covered parking spots. Voila: Love.

Marriage ensues. But when the honeymoon is over, she is hairy with a dirty car, and he is paunchy because he parks in the closest spot he can find, “Shut up, Marge! It will fit!”. They argue over fish stick dinners and watch Jeopardy, “Hank! How do you ALWAYS guess these? I mean, really? Bengal Tigers with only the S on there? Come on!”

For all of the pamphlets on faceplanet that say “Writing is work” you’ll find exactly as many that say “Writing should be easy”. (Crap!)

Art is easy? Yeah, mmmm hmmm, and I’m a natural blond.
Get off your rocker writerdome. It’s a tough racket and you better stiff that lip and nose that grindstone or whatever other euphemisms I can mess up because this ain’t your grandmother’s book club!

And what IS the first rule of book club?
I can’t hear you!
What is the first rule of book club!!!!!!

We don’t talk about book club unless it is to say that we are foofy artists who don’t really do any work (wink wink).

The writer of today looks a lot less like the olden times, quill in hand and ruffled sleeves coming out of a felt jacket. He/she better be a Rambo freaking Picasso, wearing Shakespeare’s hat and quoting Stephen King characters like a bad case of terrets, and if you don’t write your heart out to the point that your family calls the priest for an exorcism (the old one not these lame copies) you ain’t got what it takes!

If you think it’s all bunnies and Zen bubbles… Hit the road jack… with one headlight.

L

Sum of me pals

http://john-l-monk.com/

http://aliannedonnelly.com/blog/

http://www.sunnivadee.com/

http://siddaleerain.com/