A WORD FROM OUR SPONSORS

So, I still have a Facebook account, but it’s been a while since I’ve done anything with it.  In this political climate, it all gets tiring very quickly.  Most of my “friends” there are artists, writers, dreaded intellectuals, so we’re all aware of what a feeble little cumstain Trump is.  I admit, back in the day I posted my share of anti-Trump rants, but it gets old.  As does nitpicking over which Democratic candidate should be The One to take him down.  Really, my politics are my own, and a 2-party system is pretty lame, especially when they both spend millions of dollars to squash any other parties (seems sort of non-democracyish to me), and one fat buffoon can come along and totally co-opt one of the 2 parties without really even trying, showing you how shallow their beliefs were in the first place.



Bottom line - he’s a sad, tired old windbag, and I’m pretty sure I’ll still be around when both he and his political career are long dead.



So, that leaves the artists and the smarty-pants and the actual WORK they do. Some of them show this work on Facebook, and I’m all for it.  Some of them post links to other places on the internet where their work has been published, and I love it.  Hell, I do it myself.  Or at least I used to.  I stopped about 6 months ago, because of all the above bullshit, and the precious attitudes of some of the artsy types I’ve meant along the way.



Do I really need to know that you’re on chapter 23 of your projected 75 chapter novel about growing up in a house in a town in a state in a country?



Do I need to know that you just wrote “the best poem” you’ve ever written in your life?  And when someone asks “Can we see it?!” am I really that surprised when your answer is “Oh, no, I’m going to start submitting it.  I don’t want anyone to read it until it gets published!”



And will getting it published somewhere actually validate its greatness?

Newsflash - throw a stone in a ½ empty room, and you’re going to hit at least 3 people who have either just a) written the best poem of their lives, or b) are currently ass-deep in some novel no one will ever give a shit about assuming it ever gets finished.  Which it probably won’t.

So, finally, after much hemming and hawing, the heart of my bitch is this:  are you really a serious writer if you spend a good chunk of every day on social media telling everyone about what it is you’re writing?  I assume you have to eat, sleep and shit at some point.  Maybe you even have a job.  So when do you work on this masterpiece?  Do you spend as much time writing it as you do writing about it?  Probably not.



I like the artists & photographers a bit better.  They tend to just show their finished work.  Maybe talking about unfinished visual art is tougher than talking about unpublished or unwritten writing?  Maybe.



In any event, I am currently ass-deep in trying to finish up a batch of poems that, while they might not be THE BEST WORK I’VE EVER DONE, are still pretty damn good (in my opinion).  Stick around long enough, you’ll probably see them once they’re completed.  Maybe here, maybe in a zine somewhere, maybe in a collection.  I promise not to bug you anymore with their existence, though, until they’ve actually made their way out into the world.



Sweet out.