Relativity

So this week a reminder of what the world is like for a budding author.

On the spur of the moment, I entered a contest in which writers were invited to submit the first paragraph of their current work in progress. So I submitted this:

Know this, Jarrod. I will not sing. I will not wear a twee waistcoat, nor allow any damn bird to fly about my head or perch on my back as I work. I will not work. I will not say things like ‘Oh my paws and whiskers.’ I will not scamper. If provoked – and being approached with a hat or bonnet or shoes to wear is provocation enough – I will bite. And draw blood.  And I will not – I absolutely refuse – to listen if she sings.

Needless to say, since you're not hearing a lot of whooping and hollering on this blog, I did not win the contest. And that's okay. Not everyone wins contests.

But still. There were a lot of entries, and many, many of them, in my view, were crap. Obviously, a view shared by the contest holder, except that mine was lumped in with the crap. And again, that's fine. Because we're coming to the relative part.

The contest-holder said he doesn't like chatty openings. He did not define chatty. Maybe my entry is chatty. I don't know. What chatty is, and what constitutes a level of over-chattiness is undefined in this case, and, what's more important, certainly relative from person to person, contest to contest.

Here's the rub:

I soldier on. I will keep writing this work in progress, not giving a fig at the moment that other people out there may not like it. That's not important. That I continue to write, that I continue to try to be creative, that's the important thing.