It's Clearer Inside Of Me, Who I Will Always Be, Opening Up To The Stars, Crystals And Mystics And Scenics And Memories

--"All I Ever Wanted To Be", Lily Frost

Yesterday I turned in a submission for The Boston Review's Thirteenth Annual Poetry Contest. It'll be the first writing contest I've entered in ages.

I probably have no hope of winning, but that's alright. I wanted to actively put my more serious, less blog-related, work out into the universe. Now I have. It's not that I dislike writing this blog and associated promotions thereof, but, while a faithful audience, the audience for a three-man blog is rather limited in scope. I'm nothing if not curious to ascertain what the world at large views my more serious work as. I had planned to only enter their short story contest since that really is my forte. I'm really nothing much as a poet. Hell, I'm not even the best poet on this site. Yet, as Breanne says, you've got to get your face wet if you want to go swimming. Starting off with poetry, utilizing my worst skill as a writer, is my version of getting my face wet. And, really, if I wanted to be honest, I'm not all too confident about allowing others to see my works just yet. I want to put my name out there, sure. However, I want to put my feelers out beforehand.

I used to be more confident. I used to be like Lucy is about things. I used to submit stories and poems on an almost weekly basis to whatever contest, call, or query would have me. I even published a few stories and poems in collections and publications most people have never heard of. I used to get by on sheer brazen pluckiness alone. I felt unstoppable. I felt like I was shooting off a shotgun of talent, eventually something I wrote would hit something. Eventually somebody would take notice of what my imagination had to offer and I would be well on my way to becoming the country's greatest living writer. I was sure of it. Indeed, one of the first ten poetry collections I submitted to picked my poem as one of the hundred best they had seen that year. Needless to say, I let that distinction get to my head a bit. And with every small victory, every tiny glimmer of reassurance that being published gave me, I started to think that my future was being set right before my eyes. And soon confidence turned into its evil cousin, complacency.

I never stopped writing. I couldn't stop that even if I tried. What I stopped doing was looking out for opportunities to improve my gamesmanship. I stopped seeking out ways to improve what nature had gifted with me. After college, after I got that silly piece of paper saying that I was dedicated enough to specialize in Creative Writing, I thought I was done as far as maturing artistically went. I thought I had learned everything there was to learn about my craft. Or, more precisely, I thought having a degree in Creative Writing was like having a degree in Math or Business. I thought it was all the proof I needed to earn a living doing what I love. What I failed to comprehend was that you can't put a degree on art, on creating art. Many writers better than myself never went to college, or even high school. Conversely, some of the most noticeable hacks out there have matriculated from some of the more prestigious universities in the world. A piece of paper don't mean crap when it comes to pouring out your mind's fantasies onto the computer screen. It doesn't make you any better; it doesn't make you any worse. All it says is that you learned how to give and receive criticism. All it says is that you learned how to write for a deadline. All it says is that you learned about the craft from a practical point of view. What it doesn't say is whether or not you have that drive to push a project to its completion. It also doesn't say if you have that spark of inspiration which keeps you up at night because you know the idea is so utterly magnificent you're afraid you'll forget it. It doesn't magically bestow the sense of patience that real imaginative fiction or poetry demands of you.

That is my problem. All the way through school I was either the best writer or one of the best writers in my class in terms of creativity and imagination that I took it for granted that I was that damn good. It wasn't until I got to USC that I realized that there are people who were every bit as good as me (and better). But what is else, there were people out there who flat out wanted it more than me. Everyday I saw people who put in the time and the effort to make themselves better, while I coasted on the laurels of the talent I possessed once upon a time. And even when I saw my peers pull ahead of me in terms of advancing their careers in writing, even when I saw what had to be done to take writing seriously as a calling, I still was complacent about the whole affair. In the back of my head I kept reassuring myself I would be "discovered" somewhere down the line by someone. It wasn't up to me to launch myself into writing full-time; it was just a matter of time. I didn't need to do any more than I was already doing.

I fell into what my screenwriting instructor calls the drawer mentality. I thought the only effort I needed to put in was to get the pieces written. I didn't need to do all the other stuff--the querying publications, the entering national contests from these selfsame publications, the making connections with people who held the future of my writing in their hands. I fully tucked my work away in binder upon binder and, yes, placed them in drawers upon drawers. I really did have the mentality that somebody somehow was just going to come knocking on my door, look inside those drawers, tell me I was an awesome writer, and publish those stories and poems immediately. As Ilessa once told me, I took the writing itself seriously. It was just the other responsibilities of being a writer that I let slide. It's the same way I am with the writing itself. I'm very loathe to self-edit or revise. I honestly think my first effort is "good enough" because for my first seventeen years my "good enough" really was better than everyone else's best efforts. What's the point of trying extra hard when the standard effort still got me A's, still got me published, and still made me feel like I had the juice to make my dream of being a writer happen? It'd be like paddling a boat when you thought you already had a motor going. It was just unnecessary work.

But now after a decade (and some) of really not doing anything with my time but telling people I wanted to be a serious writer, I'm actually putting myself on a plan to become a serious writer. Yes, I know it's one contest. But I'm already in the process of seeing what other avenues I can explore. I'm seeing what publications I have a reasonable shot of getting published in. I'm taking my baby steps into a world I should already be into my adolescence.

And that's my fault. I let talent and confidence make a poor substitute of diligence and dedication. It's not a mistake I'm eager to continue making. Will I become the country's best writer now? Probably not. But I think I'm well on my way to becoming at the very least a writer I would be proud to read someday.

And that's all that matters.

Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers