The Elusive Target

Getting better as a writer is a destination exercise. It isn't a target.

Now, when you're mucking about in the dung heap of your drafts, it is pretty easy to see this truism.

What hurts is when you have a little success or praise. There's a thought for a minute that "it is good enough."

You wake up the next day and see you still suck as a writer. There is a mechanic of regeneration which you can apply but then, that wasn't the end for this writing business, anyway.

You didn't get in it to see you novel at WalMart.

You got in it and slaved away because you had something to say and it wouldn't stay inside. Avocations like learning the drums or needlepoint or oil painting didn't do the trick. You had to pick writing.

You poor sot.

You take aim with every piece. You write, you revise, you change what it was you were trying to say in the piece because - after all - you didn't really know when you started out.

It isn't an easy thing. If it is, you aren't applying yourself. This is a craft but it isn't something you do and sell on Etsy. You're writing because you have stories that won't stay inside.

Put another coin in the slot, get your skeeballs, and try again. We'll all still be in the arcade, too.

The goal isn't to win the stuffed panda. The goal is to feel good about the effort. As you get better, that feeling remains elusive.

We muddle on having fun in the game.

We have an odd sense of fun, don't we? Sick bastards all.