Friday, July 26, 2019

When Did I Become the Old Writer?

I don't mean my chronological age.

While talking with some other writers, I realized I've been writing for twenty-six years. Been actively pursuing publication for twenty-six years.

Now granted, I've been published in non-fiction for twelve years now, fiction for eight years. But actually putting pen to paper/typing on my typewriter/typing on my laptop? Yeah, twenty-six years. That's roughly half my life so far.

(P.S. I found the first thing I ever submitted. It sucked. Really, really sucked.)

Then I hear these other folks who've been publishing two or three years whining about how hard things are now.

It's all I can do to keep my Pepsi from spraying from my mouth. Now, I get why the old-timers (writers with a couple more decades of experience than me) get a peeved with newbies.

On the other hand, folks with more experience than me are also complaining about how hard it is. Everything changed overnight for them, and they don't know what to do.

Honestly, both sides are wrong. Today's Information Age is the best time ever to be an artist of any kind. We have so many options. We can reach billions of people around the world. I've sold books in five different continents. I've lost track of how many different countries. We writers have nothing to complain about. The audiences are there. It's up to us  to find them.

So either quit bitching about how hard writing is today, or get off my lawn!

3 comments:

  1. LOL! Yeah, it seems everyone has their own crap to gripe about. :)

    And holy sheep, my first submission to a magazine was when I was 15 years old. [boggle] It was a horrible, treacle-ridden Christmas story that I sent to McCall's magazine. I got a fifty-generation xerox rejection slip, and that was more than it deserved, heh. But yeah, it's been forty years. [faints] Only started publishing relatively recently -- 2007 in romance, and 2013 in SF etc. But I've been trying, on and off, for a ridiculously long time. :)

    Angie

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    1. But Angie, you don't bitch about how hard it is! You just keep plugging away...

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    2. LOL! Yeah, too lazy to waste energy bitching with my keyboard. I save that for muttered complaints under my breath. ;)

      Angie

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