Life, actually…

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WRITERS GOT ANTS IN THEIR SHAKERS

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Writers who use the shakers give me the shakes.

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I’m reading a submitted manuscript to see whether there’s something worthy of publishing, when suddenly I get the urge to brush all those little black ants off each page.

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Somebody has filled a salt shaker with commas and apostrophes and sprinkled them liberally throughout the piece…seemingly at random. The paragraphs are filled to the brim with improper tense and punctuation usage of their’s & theres’ and it’s and its’ and “the best city’s in the world…mens’ room…”I don’t do window’s”…package of Oreo’s…and on and on and on and on.

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We are having an ant infestation in the kitchen at home, and it’s fun to watch the little critters energetically going about their infesting. And, yes, they do look like apostrophes and commas out of control.

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Liz is an editor, too, and she finds the same plague in many documents. She passed the shaker analogy along to me, by the way.

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I find it difficult to teach the commanists and the apostrophiles how to make their work grammatical and readable with just a few simple rules. Folks who have come far enough in life to write manuscripts often feel they know all the rules and do not require instruction. Or they just don’t get it. Or they are used to depending on the editors to clean up their mess.

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Guess that has become a major codicil in the imaginary manual of editing these days—just correct the manuscript for the writer and get on with judging whether the piece has merit beyond the ants.

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And don’t get me started on social media usage. The electronic ants are beyond recall. Even the brightest, most educated and otherwise wise “friends” get it wrong every few minutes, day after day.

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Am I tilting at windmills? Should I just take E.O. Wilson’s advice and, instead of exterminating the ants in the kitchen, learn to observe and appreciate them?

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Nah. Shakers got to shake, editors got to edit

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© Jim Reed 2023 A.D.

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Listen to Jim’s podcast:

http://redclaydiary.com/mp3/writersgotantsintheirshakers.mp3

Listen to Jim:

• newtreatmentforrestlessmindsymdrome.mp3

or read on…

New Treatment for Restless Mind Syndrome

I can’t stop my brain.

Maybe you know what I’m talking about.

Whether it is 3 a.m., when I am so full of ideas, thoughts, reflections, excitements and nutty dreams that I cannot remain aslumber…whether it is while driving along, dictating loose and rambling thoughts and considerations into my tiny recording device…whether it is during a long and boring conversation with a long and boring bureaucrat who just will not get to the point…no matter where or when I am, I cannot stop my brain.

Maybe we should term this Restless Mind Syndrome and find a cure for it.

Now…never again will Restless Mind Syndrome keep you awake at night. Just two doses of MINDTAMP and you can rest at ease and blithely go through life like the Pod Person you always wanted to be.

Some time ago, I found my own way to deal with Restless Mind Syndrome. I just write it out. I allow my fingers to do the therapy…but why not read what I wrote back then?

Here it is:

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HE WAS COMPLETELY OUT OF JUICE, COMPLETELY OUT OF THE force that fed his muse, completely out of the running for cosmic insight and understanding.

He sat limp, dumbly staring at the keyboard, hoping that words would come and rise up and take over his fingers and make syllables, then sentences, then paragraphs, then Great American Novels galore.

But nothing happened.

He sat limp, staring morosely at the blank computer screen, feeling the faint radiation seeping into his brain and attacking his enfeebled thoughts and sucking them dry of life.

And nothing happened.

He sat limp, hoping that profundities would stir inside him and dribble over onto the machinery and create beautiful thoughts that would cause little children to clap their hands and old grumpies to chuckle and hide their mouths.

Lots of nothing continued to come forth.

He sat limp, wondering why his mouth was dry, his palms damp, his ears ringing, his mind racing, his thoughts crusty and useless. With blankness on the screen screaming at him.

He sat limp, admiring those who could always express themselves in ringing tones and glowing words.

And at that moment, he realized that what was going on was his writing, what was going on was what he had to say, what was seeming to be void was exactly the right thing to put down on screen on paper for comrades in writer’s block hell to share and find comfort in.

His fingers started to move and move and move

–from DAD’S TWEED COAT:SMALL WISDOMS HIDDEN COMFORTS UNEXPECTED JOYS by Jim Reed

© Jim Reed 2023 A.D.

jim@jimreedbooks.com

http://www.jimreedbooks.com

Twitter and Facebook

Life, actually…

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UP BEFORE DAYLIGHT

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Believe it or not, I was once an Alabama young’un.

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In those days my young’unhood attitudes change frequently, as un-young’unhood approaches ever so slowly but ever so surely.

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Sweet remembrance:

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I’m back in time. Today, as a kid, I can’t wait to rise with the Sun. The first  ray of daylight empowers me. I am ready to embrace the day. My Dad arises at five a.m. and is off to work. Mom is puttering about in the kitchen, preparing a second breakfast, this one for herself and us kids.

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I pull on pants and shirt, run barefoot to the open screened window, check to confirm the day. I can see sparkled dew on morning leaves, errant butterflies plying their trade, chattering birds scanning the dew for clueless worms.

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Another day begins in the paradise of young’unhood.

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Being young means my mind is lighter, not yet burdened with responsibilities beyond a few daily chores. Village elders and dedicated parents carry the load, so that I can experience a few years of carefree wonder.

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As teenagedom slowly approaches, I begin to feel the weight of life’s possibilities, life’s confusions, life’s upcoming pleasures.

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A few doubts and fears creep about. I have to start the process of taking on the world as it is slowly handed off to me by aging adults.

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I experiment with the idea of Denial. Just pretending everything is fine often makes everything fine.

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 As a teenager I am not as anxious to get up in the morning. Why does anyone want to rise at 6 a.m.? Getting up means facing teachers and bullies and acne and more chores.

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I pretty much dance around these adolescent attitudes until one summer when I go to work as a laborer on a housing construction project.

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This means getting up earlier than ever on Monday morning, riding in a pickup truck with other workers for two hours, then spending the week away from home sloughing about in blazing heat. I learn to take orders, do heavy lifting, navigate my way through the startling pathways of rough-and-tumble tough-guy culture.

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For a wimpy kid like me, all filled with writing and literature and scholarly intake and storytelling, this is quite a challenge. But, true to my nature, I absorb this educative experience and turn it all into stories. I hone my observation skills without even knowing it at the time.

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I survive the labor world and, just one year later, find the job I really want, far away from strain and heat stroke. I become a seventeen-year-old on-air radio personality.

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Imagine that.

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Within a few months, I turn into a semi-adult. Like my father, I rise before daylight—this time willingly, with enthusiasm—and rush to my job as sign-on announcer at a radio station, then later as television host. 

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I suddenly begin transitioning into the role of village elder.

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Does the heft of responsibility wear me down? Sometimes yes. But, like the kid I once was, I still check the morning dew, scope out the early birds, feel sorry for the early worms, embrace the beckoning sunshine.

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All this happens a long, long time ago. Many adventures and misadventures occur since then. A sign of encroaching maturity on my part is the fact that I won’t bore you with all those intervening stories.

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Not quite yet, anyhow.

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I was once an Alabama young’un. Maybe you, too, were once an Alabama young’un.

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Try to remember

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