Give Up Now (not Lassy)
This is not Lassy. You remember Lassy, right? “What girl? Timmy fell down the well? F#$@, that’s the third time this month.” Not that one. But maybe the television business will run out of game shows to reboot, and they’re reboot Lassy. Lassy 2.0. Or Lassy in the Metaverse (sponsored by Meta and Kelloggs).
What I’m trying to get around to is… Wow, look at that dog. Some award-winner from a red state further North. And as a writer, make a note of all of your narrative influences. The dog that could command a 30-minute sitcom was badass. I hear there were actually four Lassies on set at any given shoot, to save time on grooming and prep. Of the four Lassies I couldn’t tell the difference. I hear… No, wait, I’ve heard nothing. I’m skipping around like a flat rock with a fat side.
Art. That’s where I was going. We’re all down in a well of our own making. Mine contains songs, poems, and random stuff like this. Mostly though, as my girlfriend pointed out, you’re a diarist. Okay. Um. Like Anaïs Nin? I hear Virginia Wolf’s diaries are amazing, but I’ve never gotten a hold of them. I did look into Jack Kerouac’s journals once in college. The University of Texas at Austin has a ton of his artifacts and writings. You don’t actually get to touch the journals, but they’ve xeroxed the pages, facsimiles they call them, and you can browse through those. No phones. Only pencils and yellow legal paper which they provide. The want you to be able to get close to Jack, but not close enough to mark on, take pictures of, or monetize the collection.
A bit different from D. H. Lawrence’s memorial in New Mexico. The “ranch” says that his remains were shipped back from France and placed in the little cinderblock chapel. The Wikipedia page differs slightly. On the trip back to the US with the remains of a not-yet-famous writer, the handler was informed that a good sum of money would be required to repatriate Mr. Lawrence. His ashes were blown overboard to their delight. The urn placed in the cinder block in the wall of the memorial contains dust and dirt.
Right. So. Artists, even as grand and sensual as D. H. fucking Lawrence, have little or no chance in hell of achieving cash flow of any kind from their writing. Lassy can’t help. Only dollars can help. Like the guy who Zoomed with me yesterday and confirmed that he indeed could produce an Amazon Best-seller for me in under 30 days. Price? About $10,000. It’s the New York Times Bestseller list we need to jigger. That one would resonate nicely on my LinkedIn profile.
Over the years I’ve tried a myriad of ways to promote and cajole my writing into becoming more than the sum of its letters. So far, my “single dad dating” stuff is the only writing that’s ever garnered a modicum of success. The books are not selling. The blog is just a blog. I need a Masterclass or a community site where people can pay me monthly for the benefit of my wisdom and my glorious audience.
Nope.
Just me, writing again about some bullshit unrelated to the trigger image of Lassy, thank god.
*image: and now you’ve got Lassy on your mind (depending on your age) or WTF!!
Read more Short-Short Stories from John.
