“What you do in this world is a matter of no consequence. The question is, what can you make people believe that you have done?” Sherlock Holmes, A Study In Scarlet
Utterly cynical.
And yet….
I’ve been following the publishing industry meltdown this past couple of weeks. It was bound to come, all consumer-related industries are going to be adversely affected by this nonsensical implosion. I’ve been watchign and wondering what it might mean for… me.
At this moment I have to admit to having no career. Everything is tentative, all is on hold, I wait with baited breath (just what does that mean, I wonder?) to find out (eventually) if I’m ever going to sell anything again.
And at the moment I’m not sure I care.
Ten novels, fifty short stories. That is a career. What more can someone of modest skills and talents hope for?
Today a friend is coming over to my house to do a video interview. This will be an interesting experiment. It could open possibilities, get my face and my voice out on the web, alert people to my presence beyond those things I have already done, and hopefully give me a little better shot at continuing on in what I decided 25 years ago that I wanted to do.
I’m cleaning my office, a neverending task. I’m stumbling across the detritus of untended chores, obligations, ideas, and possibilities. Little scraps of paper with cryptic notes, phone numbers, email addresses, various numbers, single words, dates…
Last night I watched George Carlin’s last HBO Special. I’ll miss him. I’m not quite as cynical or curmudgeonly as George was, certainly not as gifted in the ability to talk about certain things in such a humorous way. I’ll miss him, his presence in the world. I never knew him, but always with celebrity like that you have the feeling that you did know him.
Afterward, a long talk with two friends, one who pointed out that I sounded depressed. Not sad, not forelorn, not pessimistic—Depressed. Maybe. It’s hard to tell. I bounce back, get excited, work on something. I am working on something lately, as I’ve mentioned. As long as the words keep coming out, some of them anyway, I don’t think I need to go to the doctor. But I passed up going to the gym again this morning. Too cold, too tired, too—
Maybe 2009 will be better. (I keep telling myself that, anyway.) Anyway, I still have more cleaning to do. I found the opening quote on an index card that it browned with age. It meant something to me at one time and I think it still does.
What does it mean to you?
