Yesterday was such a nice day. Not weather wise. For me it was too cold. What made yesterday so nice was that I spent the day with my husband and oldest daughter. We drove to her college and spent the afternoon talking and laughing.
Normally I will go see our daughter every two weeks by myself to re-stock her groceries. My husband either has to work or is too exhausted to go with me, so it was nice to have him there. I know that food is abundant on campus but there are times that she doesn't have time to go eat before everything closes or she is just so deep in her studies that she ends up eating in her dorm room. I am a worrier when it comes to 'are they eating right?' and 'are they warm enough?' It was easy when I had all of my chicks in the nest but now I have to work a little harder to make sure that they have everything that they need.
My husband is not a talker, so during the ride, when he decided it was time to give me some advice, I was kind of shocked. I was tickled too because I had no idea that he has been paying such close attention to something I have been dealing with. I will warn you, to some people, this is going to sound snotty and egotistic but it's really not. It is just part of my life that I need to adjust in order to reach my goals.
My husband wanted to talk about my writing and why I have a fear of sending out a manuscript before it is absolutely perfect. I have explained to him many times , plus one more time yesterday, that an un-polished manuscript sent out to an agent or a publisher will end up in 'the pile of death'. That is just how it works. He pointed out to me that I have been buying and reading books by best selling authors that were pure crap and their work didn't end up in 'the pile'. I have too, and they are crap in my opinion. I recently read a book by a best selling author who ended the love/adventure story by making the leading man turn into the loch ness monster at night. I thought my eyes were going to roll right out of my head and bounce across the floor. I don't want someone spending their hard earned money on my work only to roll their eyes in the last chapter.
Then he pointed out that I have been published in two separate poetry anthologies and even won a prize for one of those poems. Why, he wanted to know, don't I write a book of poetry? Because I don't want to. Here is what happened; I can write poetry all day long. It comes easy to me and I find no challenge in it. Some of the poems are beautiful and they do touch some people but it is not what I want to do. I entered that last contest (it was a national poetry society yearly contest, looking for new poets) because the first place prize was $15,000.00 and I wanted to use that money to buy my husband a few commercial grade saws for his shop. There we're over 70,000 entries. The poets that placed first through fifteenth would be read onto a cd (which would be sold in certain stores) and given a copy of the anthology along with a certificate and a ribbon. I placed 11th. That pissed me off.
While everyone around me was pointing out that I had placed 11th out of over 70,000 poems and I should be proud of that, all I could think was, "Great. Now he won't get his saws." I took the anthology, the cd, the ribbon and the certificate and tossed them in the dumpster. I didn't care one little bit about them. I cared about whether or not my husband got the tools that he needed for his shop. I haven't bothered to enter another one of those contests.
Yes, I know, it seems childish but I don't want to write poetry unless it benefits the people that I care about. I want to write the things that make you wonder if you should check your shoes before you stick your feet in them. When the darkness looks back at you, what are its intentions? When you are alone and feel a cold breath on the back of your neck, are you really alone? I want to stand shoulder to shoulder with the big boys of horror -and that scares me. Am I good enough? Poetry doesn't give me that stomach twisting nervousness.
My husband suggested that I merge the two like Edgar Allen Poe. I told him that Poe's work is great but the man was straight up crazy. He just grinned and said, "Crazy people never know they are crazy." So I immediately start over analyzing myself to determine if I really am nuts and quickly came to the conclusion that it doesn't matter. He loves me. Crazy and all.
At a stop sign a half a mile from home, he turned to me and said, "Baby, you will always be afraid of failing until you fail and you can't do that until you put yourself out there. Get the manuscript done and send it out. Someone is going to like it." I love that man.
He is right. I can't let fear hold me back. Especially when fear is what I write about. Failure is just a learning experience. It isn't the end of a dream. It is merely a stepping stone. I have ten manuscripts waiting for polish. It is time for me to get to work.
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