Editor: "I liked your article, but it isn't what I need. Write a humorous piece, please."
Writer: "Humor? You mean like Seinfeld or Leno? Me? Write humor?"
Editor: "Yes, humor, you."
That did it! Procrastination set in. For days I've sat before a blank screen pleading for inspiration. I don't do humor. Angst, murder, mayhem of all sorts, and tender, touching articles that speak to the writer's heart, that's what I do: Not humor, not making funny, not me.
Procrastination, like the Ogre in the attic, has me in its spell. Inspiration flees up the spiral staircase and hides itself among the cobwebs in my mental storage bins. I, the woebegone, sit here like I'm diagonally parked in a parallel universe.
Stray thoughts race through my mind. You have the right to remain silent--anything you say will be misquoted, then used against you. Seen it all, done it all, can't remember most of it. Everyone has a photographic memory. Some don't have film. Ah, that's the problem, no film.
Pardon me for an hour or so. I must run to the store and buy film. Then, there's the dusting to be done and laundry and I really should answer my Email. Oh, yes, I may get back here sometime next week.
"Hi there, did you miss me?" While I was gone, I talked to my Psychiatrists and he said that one of four people are mentally ill. He also said that I should check with three friends and if they are okay, then I'm IT! Encouraging? Not the word I'd choose.
Okay, okay, I know I've put this off as long as possible. You must excuse me, I'm procrastinating. We writers do that so well. Put off until next week what we cannot do today. Unfortunately, it is now next week.
I'm in the attic now going through those mental bins looking for Mr. Inspiration. Surely something funny happened to me on the way to adulthood. I must find it. Writers are masters of observation. We store things up, keep them for a rainy day and then put our observations on paper.
What's this? Oh, I remember little Lucy well. She was my first dog. She died while drinking water on a summer's day. Just fell over in her water bowl with her little pink tongue lolled out. Poor baby. Tears well up in my eyes as I replace that memory. What's this one? Possible? I'm three years old, my Uncle Jack is fishing off a pier at Mustang Island in the Gulf. He flipped up a large crab with monstrous claws. The dreaded thing is crawling on my blanket spread out on the wooden boards. It's after me, run! No where to . . . Not funny? No, a terror-filled moment for a pudgy toddler. Memories of grandparents long dead, life's failures mixed with a few successes lumber into consciousness. Nothing funny here, only cobwebs abound with itsy-bitsy spiders from days gone by.
Suddenly, I'm aware that those who live by the sword get shot by those who don't. The firing squad is gathering. Time is running through my fingers like sand in an hour glass. Good grief, a clichéd
simile, or was that a metaphor? My goose is cooked. I'm a dead duck. Help, I need help.
"Psst, hey you."
"Who said that?"
"It's me, over here in the corner. Open your eyes, silly head."
"I don't want to. You have to be another nightmare."
"Nightmare? Not quite. I'm what you've been looking for. My name is Inspiration."
"Sure it is, and I'm Minnie Mouse."
"You may well be, but I am your Muse, your sweet inspiration."
"If so, then help me write a humorous column."
"If you weren't so self-absorbed, you'd know I've been with you all along. Look back over what you've typed. See the humor in it?"
"You call this humor?"
"Well, you won't get invited to do stand-up on the Letterman show, but maybe your editor will take pity on you and give you E for effort. You didn't give me much cooperation, you know what with all that talk about procrastination."
"Sorry."
"I know you are. Just be a good little writer and submit this article. They won't eat you."
I'm totally embarrassed and have only one last bit of sage advice for those kind folks who may be given the opportunity to read this pitiful effort. If at first you don't succeed, skydiving isn't for you.
###
(Jones is a book critic for The Tulsa World, Tulsa, OK, and The Camden Times, Camden, New York.)
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