There are two schools of thought regarding bandages (Band-Aid, as it turns out, is a brand name): those who advocate swift removal, and those who prefer slow. Each method has its merits as well as demerits. The swift method is painful but gets it over quickly. The peel method isn’t as painful, but lasts longer. It reminds me of submitting stories for publication. After screwing up my courage for weeks, I finally submitted a collection of stories to a publisher. This is a combination of some twenty-one weird tales, only eight of which had been previously published. To me they looked, in turn, impressive and pedestrian. Since I have a storehouse of unpublished pieces, I was able to make substitutions until I finally got what I thought was a moody collection. Tom Petty’s song “The Waiting” has always had a special poignance to me. The question is, would I prefer a swift jerking off of the bandage or a slow peeling where I can feel each...
Blog of a struggling writer.