Young'Uns

A recent call for manuscripts in a literary journal revealed my reality.  I'm now old.  Over the hill.  No longer part of that "young writers" chorus that ever more frequently gets the nod to submit material for special editions and anthologies.  Everyone wants that undiscovered talent.  The fresh voice.  The young gun.

Well, I ain't young any more.  Based on the growing popularity of the young writers competitions that are floating over the pages, a young writer is anyone who is forty or below.

I did happen to see one call for manuscripts recently (in the New Yorker nonetheless) that was a clear invitation for the older set, but I felt too depressed to write anything, knowing that I would be submitting under the moniker: "that old hick guy from Indiana".  It's tough to write when an editor is reminding you that you could, at any moment, keel over with a heart attack or suddenly develop a severe case of liver spots that could render you unphotogenic.  And this while writing.  Only God knows what can happen to us old folks if we exert energy from hiking or falling down the stairs.  What if we try to get out of bed too quickly?  Could bust a hip.

I'm glad that writers don't have to reveal their ages.  Outside of my wife and family, my agent, and a few select editors, few people in the publishing world actually know my situation.  I am, for the most part, an unknown.  I stand or fall on the quality of my writing alone.  Age be damned.  But I like this about writing.  It's the quality of the work that counts, not one's station of life.  As long as I can move my fingers and my brain can string words together, I can write.

Back in college, I did win a "young poets" competition once . . . but that's water under the bridge, as they say.  I got to read my poems on stage in a smoky bar, and much of the smoke back in that early 1980s environment wasn't tobacco . . . if you know what I'm saying.  That night, I was transported via second-hand smoke into another realm.  I saved damsels, slayed dragons, and received applause.  In the morning I didn't remember anything.

But those younger days of second-hand smoke (I'm telling you, I never inhaled!) are far behind me.  Now I'm healthy as a prize pig.  I work out.  I eat right.  And as for winning competitions, I'm satisfied that I have a woman who loves me four days out of seven, and my chief aim is doing the best I can with what God gave me . . . which probably isn't saying a lot.  I just write.  And when the call comes for manuscripts from "old guys who still have a mortgage and eat licorice", I'll be ready with my essay entitled:  "I'm Not Interesting, but I Can Still Lift a Hundred Pounds and I Don't Yet Have a New Ball-N-Socket."