Pedicab Turned Up to Eleven

It's so hard to start sometimes. Or maybe, I should revise and say, continue.

For years, I've been copying submission guidelines from the backs of magazines into my notebook-of-the-moment only to be exhausted at the end of the process, close the book and never send a thing.

Today, I sent something to Brevity. I had to trim a hundred words from an already somewhat micro collage CNF piece. And you know what? It wasn't that hard. Sometimes the things we become attached to are just the non-essential organs of the whole. They buffer. They, in their worst moments, distract from the parts that need to be held higher.

Upon arriving to my studio space, I had a backpack full of books, San Pellegrino and my necessary technology. I touched one book briefly, took a disorienting nap and ate a dinner of cheese and crackers. After submitting the short piece, I began a revision on a longer one.

All of my efforts today have been driven by my secret "Submit Here" board on Pinterest.

I get overwhelmed by the amount of information that comes through my networks about submitting. To save myself from the crushing pressure of desire to be published and a desktop full of half-finished things, I started pinning things so I could have that conversation with myself at another time. Today was the first day in months I felt enough space around me to begin poking through that collection of calls.

There is a pedicab that circles the block, blaring "music from the 90s up to today's hits." He has a way of circling back the moment I get deep into a new sentence. He's a friendly guy though. I've seen him turn down his stereo when he approaches someone with a stroller with a potentially sleeping baby inside.

Just another call, today, telling me to keep going. Other days, offering me a place to stop. The world is never going to quiet itself for me.

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