How To Become A Writer in Five Easy Steps

I had a thought the other day. It wasn't a very big one, but I did have one. And the thought was this: People say they want to be writers -- write columns, essays, books that make them rich and famous -- but they get bogged down in the day-to-day chore of living and never actually do anything about it.

Maybe they (and I'm really talking to YOU), maybe you think it takes up too much time, and there's not enough time in the day to get started. Maybe you think ideas come from outer space, and your space suit is always out of commission whenever you really need it. Or maybe you just need my "How To Become A Writer in Five Easy Steps" essay to jumpstart a surge of creativity that will get you started and last a lifetime.

Well, here it is, my "How To Become A Writer in Five Easy Steps" essay. I hope it works for you!

1. Get An Idea. Ideas don't come from outer space. They come from your backyard. They come from your overflowing toilet. They come from the leftovers in the back of the refrigerator that look like they're about to start breathing. They come from Wal-Mart. They come from dirty dishes. They come from work. They come from your children. They come from someone else's children. They come from everywhere -- okay, even outer space. If you can't find an idea, then you're just not paying attention.

2. Choose Your Weapon. Want to write with pad and pencil? That's your choice. Want to write on a computer? Go for it. Want to write on a napkin at your favorite bar -- the one where you always complain to the bartender how you want to be a writer, but you can't find the time, and then get miserably drunk and pass out on the floor? It's up to you. Just make a choice and stick with it.

3. Sit Your Butt Down And Begin. This may be a little confusing, so let me break it down for you: Sit! Sit Down! Sit Down On Your Butt! Once You're On Your Butt, Begin! Begin is another word for Start. It doesn't matter if you have five hours or five minutes. Just Begin.

4. Revise Everything Until It's Not Crap. Everything you write down first is CRAP! Nothing comes out great the first time. That's why you Edit. Revise. Copy. Paste. Destroy. Give Mouth to Mouth. Slap. Jab. Throw Down. Pick Up. Edit again. Realise it's still CRAP and start all over. Keep doing that until it's NOT CRAP! How will you know when it's NOT CRAP? I don't know. I'm still working on that part.

5. Let Someone Read It. People say they only want to write for themselves, for their own enjoyment. Well, that's a bunch of goat poop. People write stuff because they want people to read it. Maybe not now, maybe not tomorrow, but sometime. So, when you're finished writing what it is you've written, let someone read it. 

And then...

Find yourself another idea! Choose your weapon. Sit your butt down and begin. Revise everything until it's NOT CRAP. Let someone read it. Then Start All Over Again!

If you can do all that -- whether you become famous or not -- then you can proudly call yourself a writer.

Congratulations! I knew you could do it!

Try to surround yourself with optimistic eggs

I prefer brown eggs. Buying them makes me feel like I could’ve gathered them myself out on the farm, if only I had a farm. Those clone-like logo-stamped white eggs don’t give me the same feeling. Are they cheaper? Yes. But they’re probably manufactured by robot chickens in a solar-powered, air-conditioned warehouse somewhere off in Nevada’s Mohave Desert. I don’t mind paying a premium price for eggs that remind me of grassy meadows, windmills and simpler times. 

Of course it’s just a marketing scheme. But it’s a good one. Buying brown eggs makes me feel like I’m supporting small farms run by large families that gather dozens of eggs before the sun comes up. It’s organic. Green. Healthier. And each egg is unique, reminding me of old friends and absent family — Grandma, Papa Dutch, Uncle Bobby, Mom and Dad.

No, I’ve never gathered eggs or milked cows or called in the goats or mucked out the stables. For a city boy, that’s a foreign world. Something you read about in stories. But there they are: brown eggs in the dairy section, supposedly fresh off the farm — which makes me curious about those families, and whether or not their children are still walking five miles to get to school, up a steep hill both there and back again, barefooted, come rain or blizzard.

That homegrown illusion got elevated even more last Saturday when I went shopping for eggs and found a small newspaper-like clipping tucked inside the carton. It had a recipe on it, a cartoon, a “Bird of the Month” photo (a Majestic Maria), and a mini story and photo about egg farmers Matt and Sarah.

After reading the story, I of course wanted more information on Matt and Sarah and their six kids. So I sent an email to the egg company asking if they could get me in touch with the family. But so far, I haven’t heard anything back. Maybe I should give it more time. Maybe they have poor cell reception, or prefer getting real letters stamped and delivered through the post office.

In the meantime, I did an internet search for “Matt and Sarah,” “egg farmer,” “six children,” and “Matt and Sarah’s Dutch Puff Pancakes.” That was the recipe I mentioned. I had high hopes my internet search would provide me with egg-sactly (sorry) the information I was looking for. But of course, it didn’t.

I found information on a Matt and Angela who live on a small working farm with their one son and two dogs and who are more into boarding horses and baking macarons than gathering brown eggs and making pancakes. No doubt I found the wrong Matt. But then again, what if there isn’t a “right” Matt?

What if Matt and Sarah are the AI-generated parents of an AI-generated family that some large egg conglomerate created just to increase profits? I’m so hoping that’s not the case because that would be stooping lower than a snake trying to scratch a belly itch on a worn-out piece of used sandpaper. But that’s where we are — living in unwanted pessimistic times when all we really want is to meet real people doing good things for others just because they can. 

Enter Reese and Danyele.

Reese and Danyele don’t have a farm. They have one daughter, two dogs, and a pen full of chickens. I saw the chickens with my own eyes. They produce a lot of brown eggs. Too many for a family of three to ever use. So, Reese and Danyele gave me a couple dozen. Each egg different. Unique. Just like people. Good eggs that help us remember that our glass is always half full, if only we have eyes to see it that way.

Living the Hummingbird life

It's tough to catch a hummingbird just sitting in one place.

I took this one shot and he was all...

1. SEE ya, sucka!

2. Wouldn't wanna BE ya, sucka!

3. Gonna sit for just a minute in your TREE ya, sucka!

4. Then I'm gonna buzz your old fat head, spin around, upside down, hover for a while until you think I'm gonna try sucking juice out of your ear to make you FLEE ya, sucka!

5. Oh, look! A flower! 

It was the least I could do

So I’m guessing you noticed that I washed some of the dishes last night and put most of them away. Very thoughtful of me. Right? One question, though: where do you keep the potato smasher? I thought you usually put it in the vintage milk-glass pitcher on the counter next to the oven with the other “too big to go into the silverware drawer” utensils, but I wasn’t sure. So I put it in the fridge, just in case you go looking for it and are wondering where it is. 

And while I’m thinking about it, I put the 18-inch casserole dish in the cabinet with the coffee mugs. It makes getting to some of those mugs a little tricky, but you could always use the other ones. I mean, we have at least 120 of them. Plenty to choose from. I would have put the casserole dish in with the other ones, nested inside each other, but I thought this kitchen needed a little spicing up. A bit more “coolness” vibe. Yes?

Speaking of ice trays. I’m not sure if you’ve ever noticed, but when I empty out the ice trays, I put them back in the freezer without water in them. It’s called “pre-cooling” the trays. Sort of like pre-heating the oven. Imagine how long it would take to cook a meatloaf if you didn’t. Anyways, I read somewhere on the Internet that pre-cooling the ice trays makes for better ice making. So don’t get mad when you see them empty up there. It’s just basic science stuff.

Oh, stop it. There’s no need to thank me for helping around the house. It was the least that I could do.

Changing the subject. I’ve noticed lately how tall the grass has been getting. I say grass, but what is really growing are the weeds — the grass, too, but mostly weeds. I wouldn’t mind spending more time out in the yard, in the fresh air, with nature, and the weed-eater, turning our yard into something we could be proud of instead of something that looks like a vacant lot next to an abandoned meth house — but I’m trying to show empathy for our neighbors.

You see, if I get the lawnmower out today, mow everything in perfectly straight lines, trim, edge, fertilize, add new plants, flowers, trees, hedges, and build a small waterfall, with the water flowing into a small koi pond surrounded by exotic Japanese plants — well, our neighbors might feel bad that they’re unable to keep up with the Smiths and Joneses. And we can’t have that, can we? It just wouldn’t be neighborly.

The same goes for washing the car. Sure, I’ve heard there’s a new carwash in town. I drove by it the other day. Looks kinda fancy. I would think myself the luckiest person in the world if my car was always spick and span, washed and waxed. But the neighbors might become envious of my always-shiny rims and my clear-as-glass windshield. And we both know that “envy” is a four-letter word that leads us all down a foul-mouthed path toward the rocky ledges of jealousy, desire, and bitterness. No ma’am. We can’t have any of that either, can we?

So that’s why I think it’s best for me to leave everything like it is. The car a little grimy, the yard a little unkept, the ice trays in a constant pre-cool status and ready at a moment’s notice, the dishes stacked in random “let’s go on a treasure hunt” places, and me stretched out on the couch resting from all the hard work I was thinking about doing today, but decided tomorrow would suffice. Sound good?

Little Sally Rode the Bus

With school soon to be in full swing, I'm betting there will be a lot of Little Sallys and little Joshes riding on school buses. 

Little Sally Rode the Bus

Little Sally rode 

the bus to school 

each morning without fuss,

even though it
was bumpy,
and smelly,
and hot in the summer,
and cold in the winter,
because Josh,
who sat in Seat 7,
was so cute,
and Little Sally was in love.

This week in "Spooky Science"

According to my interpretation of quantum mechanics, dishes left overnight in the kitchen sink are both clean and dirty — a paradox of quantum superposition — until the dishes are observed the next morning by the wife who stumbles into the kitchen looking for a cup of coffee.

SHE: Hey, it was YOUR turn to do the dishes last night. What’s up?

HE: Funny thing: I was reading about Schrödinger and his cats when I dozed off, and had a dream that every cat in the neighborhood was scratching and yowling at our front door looking to be fed. When I opened the door, they were all staring at me with hunger in their eyes. And then I woke up, and here we are.

The same thing holds true for cat litter boxes. They are both used and unused until you smell something horrendous coming from the hallway. The older cats know the rules, but that younger one? Well, it’s obvious he’s gotten too big for his britches and thinks the whole “clean up your own mess before it starts smelling like a backed-up toilet” thing doesn’t apply to him.

SHE: Hey, it was YOUR turn to change the litter box last night. What’s up?

HE: That’s weird. I don’t think my schnozzola is working at full capacity. I haven’t smelled a thing in months. I think I could walk up to that cat box, put my nose right…OH MY. Now I smell it. Out it goes!

It’s all relative, really. What smells like garlic to one, might smell like dirty feet to another. What smells like rain to your grandfather might smell like wet dog to your grandmother. What smells like exploration to me, might smell like “Dang it, now I’m going to have to find a new place to hide the Christmas presents” to her. Neither is right nor wrong, we’re just viewing reality from different corners of our own personal universes.

(Although, I hope we can agree that if someone offers to sell you 50,000 shares of vintage Machu-Picchu Bank & Trust stocks, promising they will double in value in three weeks as long as you put $10,000 in unmarked bills in a brown paper bag in the trashcan next to the baseball field tonight before midnight  — well, that might sound a bit iffy.)

It all reminds me of poor Gus. Captain Augustus “Gus” McCrae. Former Texas Ranger played by Robert Duvall in the hit miniseries “Lonesome Dove” which was based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel of the same name written in 1985 by Larry McMurtry.

Poor Gus died because he was too prideful to have his leg amputated; thought he would be a burden. You and I, on the other hand, might have made a different choice, like living out our lives with bionic legs and being as happy as organic clams about it. But not poor Gus.

SHE: Oh please. What does Gus have to do with anything you’ve been talking about?

HE: It’s “poor” Gus. He let his vanity and pride end his life like black holes crashing into each other at the far reaches of the universe.

SHE: Oh, no you don’t, mister. You can’t just change the subject in the middle of a…

If two black holes collide a billion light years away in interstellar space, and no one is around to see it happen, does the collision still make a gravitational wave? And if it does, when it gets to our shores, would the wave be too mushy for any respectable surfer to even give it a go? Discuss.

Man, Texas is hot! Caliente hot!

Inside my car, on a hot parking lot, at noon.

 

Turn out the lights, the party's over

What do I do now?

“What do you mean, what do you do now? Maybe put the cap back on the toothpaste?”

But I wasn’t brushing my teeth.

“Then what have you been doing in there all this time?”

Staring at myself in the mirror wondering who is that guy, and what is he going to do now?

“Hey. You’re starting to scare me. Are you alright?”

The Scottish are gone. And the Norwegians. They’re all gone. The French, the Spanish, the Tunisians, the Japanese. They just up and left us, as if we could manage without them. But I don’t think we know how.

“Oh. The World Cup. Is it finally over?”

In the holy name of St. Luigi Scrosoppi, the Patron Saint of Footballers, how could the World Cup be over so soon? Four years of anticipation followed by a mere moment of celebration, and now the party’s over and all the cousins are heading back home. And the question remains, what do I do now?

“You know, it’s been a while since you’ve mowed the yard.”

I knew you were going to say that. But I’ll have you know I’m not the only one who feels this way. I was listening to Rebecca Lowe on her podcast with…

“You’ve been listening to a soccer podcast?”

…Brendan Hunt, and she asked from her listeners if they had any tips for getting over something like this after it comes to an end.

“A podcast. You. I don’t think I know you anymore.”

I didn’t write in with any suggestions because I didn’t have any at the time. I was just in shock that someone else felt the same way as I do. And if WE feel this way, maybe everybody else is going through these same feelings. Especially the athletes. And the play-by-play folk. And the hotdog venders. And the… Hmmmmm. Do you think maybe I’ve gone off the deep end on all this?

“Maybe a little. Listen, I know it’s hard, dear, but I think if you just focus your thoughts on other things, you’ll soon get over this. Just like everyone else.”

(The two stopped and looked at each other. One in shock that the world might not be coming to an end. The other in shock that the other actually thought that it had.)

You’re right. Just refocus. Maybe read a book. Wash the cars. Maybe go outside and see if the lawn mower still works. Maybe cut the grass short, add some fertilizer, turn our backyard into a football pitch — a soccer field — and buy some white paint and paint some…

“You’ve got to be kidding me.”

…sidelines. Maybe build a…

“Do you even hear yourself?” 

…goal out of some PVC pipes and some netting. And then…

“Forty-one years of marriage. I thought nothing could surprise me anymore. But I was wrong. You never cease to amaze me.”

I know. Awesome idea. Right?

“What would be awesome if you’d pry yourself off the couch, throw away all those chip and cookie bags, and maybe even take a shower.”

And when I’m not outside playing football, I can re-watch all the World Cup matches, but this time in Spanish. Are there any movies on soccer I can watch? More podcasts? Surely I could find replays of every soccer match that’s been televised throughout the ages. If so, I best start watching them now. I’ve only got four years until World Cup 2030. So much to do, so little time.

Texas Hoss wisdom on Cast Iron

 

An Ode to Peanut M&Ms

CHORUS — Oh, I wish I hadn’t eaten all those Peanut M&Ms on Thursday, but the bag was within arm’s reach, how it got there, I don’t know. Not a small bag that you purchase as a snack ‘tween lunch and dinner, but an industrial size 10-gallon bag I devoured in just one go. And my wife, she shook her head and said, “You’ve got a problem.” I agreed. But I kept popping those chocolate pills as if they were candy (which they were). Oh, woe is me.

VERSE ONE — I’m not exactly sure when my addiction did begin. Maybe Christmas, maybe Halloween. I was 6, or was I 9? But I’m pretty sure some M&Ms filled my stocking, or Trick-or-Treat bin. The plain ones. Easy to swallow whole. But that would be asinine.

VERSE TWO — You can’t beat peanuts for a snack, the roasted kind still in their shell. To crack them out and eat them’s worth the work, the whole day long. And then there’s chocolate, king of sweets, one piece is good, a bar is better, but add some peanuts to the mix? I can’t tell right from wrong.

CHORUS — Oh, I wish I hadn’t eaten all those Peanut M&Ms on Thursday, but the bag was within arm’s reach, how it got there, I don’t know. Not a small bag that you purchase as a snack ‘tween lunch and dinner, but an industrial size 10-gallon bag I devoured in just one go. And my wife, she shook her head and said, “You’ve got a problem.” I agreed. But I kept popping those chocolate pills as if they were candy (which they were). Oh, woe is me.

VERSE THREE — The peanut ones I do enjoy, sometimes they’re honey roasted. I go for almonds in a pinch, a change is sometimes good. The pretzel ones are kind of nice, I like the way they’re toasted. But really, when they’re in the house, they’re all my favorite food.

CHORUS — Oh, I wish I hadn’t eaten all those Peanut M&Ms on Thursday, but the bag was within arm’s reach, how it got there, I don’t know. Not a small bag that you purchase as a snack ‘tween lunch and dinner, but an industrial size 10-gallon bag I devoured in just one go. And my wife, she shook her head and said, “You’ve got a problem.” I agreed. But I kept popping those chocolate pills as if they were candy (which they were). Oh, woe is me.

BRIDGE — And when that candy all is gone, there’s no room for debate, you feel just like a speedboat dragging anchors across a lake.

INSTRUMENTAL BREAK — Maybe a guitar solo, or saxophone. Better yet, a kazoo.

VERSE FOUR — Peanut M&Ms are nice for each and all occasions. Like Mother’s Day or Hanukkah or funerals if you dare. They’re great for birthday parties or a senior graduation. A bag or three at weddings show you have a touch of flare. And if someday you stumble into an odious divorce, you fight to keep the M&Ms though it’ll make the whole thing worse.

CHORUS — Oh, I wish I hadn’t eaten all those Peanut M&Ms on Thursday, but the bag was within arm’s reach, how it got there, I don’t know. Not a small bag that you purchase as a snack ‘tween lunch and dinner, but an industrial size 10-gallon bag I devoured in just one go. And my wife, she shook her head and said, “You’ve got a problem.” I agreed. But I kept popping those chocolate pills as if they were candy (which they were). Oh, woe is me.