TKOG Who stops polishing and starts publishing

NTKOG #164: The kind of sickly over-confident writer who — casting aside the prescribed months of editing, polishing, self-doubt and anguish — feverishly types whatever literary mess pops into her head and emails it to editors before she even triple-checks the spelling.

I am: at a loss for literary inspirations that defy the sacrosanct writing workshop model. Which is to say: stories should be agonizingly written, soul-suckingly drafted, edited to the to the whims of popular taste, and, of course, prominently feature the quiet death of a dissatisfying marriage.

I am not: happy with the way my work feels when I do what I’m supposed to. But what other option is there?

The Scene: Various coffee shops around Cambridge over the past few weeks, writing my dang heart out like it’s a second full-time job. Which is kind of is. Minus the whole getting paid aspect.

Not to bore you with my daily schedule, but aside from regular writing for three blogs, at present I’m writing one short story and in various stages of editing with three others. A frustrating thing, though: I’ve noticed that the more I edit my fiction, taking in account the literary wisdom of the crowd, the further it gets from something I’d actually like to read.

This gets discouraging fast. So when I’m struggling with my fiction, in order to regain my sense of urgency, often I’ll write a little one- or two-page nothing. An essay or scene absolutely bubbling with insanity, but hot and fast and sort of sickly compelling. I’d return to these mini-essays or scenes over the course of my writing session and reread them with approval. “Good gravy,” I’d lecture myself, “Why can’t you write anything like that?!”

But of course I had written something like that. Exactly like it, in fact. So, two weeks ago, burned out by round after ceaseless round of rejection letters for my “good” and “proper” stories, I figured, frig it, what do I have to lose? And sent out a two-page raw horrorscape to a handful of different magazines. Rejection, rejection, rejection — and then, yesterday, when I logged into my email:

“It is our pleasure to accent your story for our” — wait, what?! It’s been so long since I’ve seen an acceptance letter that I’m not exaggerating when I tell you I stared blankly at the screen for a full thirty seconds before the news actually sunk in.

Later in the day, buoyed by my off-the-wall success, I decided to send out a truly unpublishable piece to a fledgling journal soliciting pieces for the inaugural issue. It was so crazy that I could barely reread it — let alone imagine another human being liking it…

Now guess who has an essay entitled “On Cock” coming out in a real honest-to-god magazine in the fall?!

The Verdict: Two pieces in one day? Well, my life is just about perfect. Not to mention the fact that somebody’s printing my linguistic erotica. And accepted it with a less than two-hour turnaround. And said my prose made her “tongue feel all jellified” when she read it out loud. Jesus, somebody pinch me.

Well, not too hard, though. Because I have another full day of writing today. And tomorrow and the day after that and the day after that. But this is what I’m doing it for. I set out to my my dreams come true and goddamnit it seems like they actually are.

Okay. Stop reading this. Log onto Duotrope and submit some of your stuff — the crazier and rawer, the better, apparently!

Tagged as: flying my freak flag; literary-type-dudes saluting it, fun fact: the "on cock" essay started out as an extremely nerdy sexytimes email to the ex and is a linguistic breakdown of the word cock, i feel like an ass when i post about 1) being a writer or 2) good things happening to me but i'm over the moon and y'all have to deal, in case you're wondering the magazines are decomP magazinE and smash cake, in her congratulations email my mom told me: "As your mother I kind of expect you to be a highly respected author in your generation." OKAY NO BIG DEAL NO PRESSURE THERE MOM, publishing, seriously duotrope is the best, to celebrate my day of two acceptance letters i let myself stop writing at 9pm and get a full eight hours of sleep, writing