The Vogel Boatman (boatperson is a preferable word to boatman but is not as readily understood as I intend it to be understood)
The people at work have been hassling me to get my manuscript ready to enter The Vogel Award, this is because they are all too old to enter. Next year the prize is going to be $25 000 with a further $25 000 advance from Allen & Unwin, people attending the award ceremony traditionally get to take home a bag of vogel products such as bread. Free bread is good.
This morning after another barrage of "just enter" I thought by George I'll do it but tonight its a different story. I am very busy and important. I have telly to watch and facebook to watch and blog to watch. I have cigarettes to smoke, cakes to regret and cat to look at. I don't have time to be messing about with manuscripts. This is the official story but the truth is slightly more disturbing.
My manuscript, the printed out version, is currently wrapped in gladwrap and stuffed in an envelope and hidden under a saddle under my bed, so that it can't hurt me. That just about sums up my relationship with my manuscript at the moment. I'm not sure what to do, I keep thinking that it would help to set it on fire. Writing can be difficult and sometimes requires being able to squash yourself flat and crawl right under the bed, right to the back near the wall. Maybe I should try painting?
This morning after another barrage of "just enter" I thought by George I'll do it but tonight its a different story. I am very busy and important. I have telly to watch and facebook to watch and blog to watch. I have cigarettes to smoke, cakes to regret and cat to look at. I don't have time to be messing about with manuscripts. This is the official story but the truth is slightly more disturbing.
My manuscript, the printed out version, is currently wrapped in gladwrap and stuffed in an envelope and hidden under a saddle under my bed, so that it can't hurt me. That just about sums up my relationship with my manuscript at the moment. I'm not sure what to do, I keep thinking that it would help to set it on fire. Writing can be difficult and sometimes requires being able to squash yourself flat and crawl right under the bed, right to the back near the wall. Maybe I should try painting?
Comments
Having said that,-pull it out and have a confrontation. You own it,-not the other way around. You two need to have a good talk and a cup of tea. I never submitted and the regrets are worse than any rejection would ever have been. (Especially when I heard the winning composition...trite fluff worthy only of elevators)
Rups xox
After one year of study the master made the student make twenty identical and beautiful teapots in an impossibly short time. The man struggled for three days straight and when the master returned they were lined up, identical, beautiful.
The master handed the man a stick and said now smash them. The man wept as he smashed then stood sweating and struggling for breath. The master said "Now you are the master of your work. It is not the master of you".
This is a story about remembering to be The Captain of What You Do.