In Praise of Fathers Supporting the Young Writers in Their Lives

 

My dad and I at a poetry event in San Francisco

 

This Father’s Day, my kids and I will be celebrating their dad. As for me, my dad has been gone for eleven years, but I will still be thinking about him too. My dad and I may have had some complications, but there is one thing that I will always remember about him: He supported my writing.

 

As a young adult, my dad helped me to understand contracts I received for getting books and my writing published. He also offered pointers on the query letters I sent through the mail. (This was before sending queries through email became standard.) He asked to read my stories and he was supportive when I wanted to buy writing magazines. He bought me an electronic typewriter (a step up from the traditional typewriter I used!) and also tackled printer problems when I was trying to print out my work on the computer.

 

It was my dad and one of my sisters who went with me to San Francisco to attend a poetry event. And my dad often shared about my writing when people visited at our home.

 

Both of my parents were very supportive of my writing and I am grateful that my dad would show that same support too. In fact, they agreed to allow me to host meetings of a poetry club that I ran inside of their home.

 

The support of my parents is something that meant a lot to me. I’m glad they were so supportive of my writing when I was growing up, especially my dad.

 

This is the kind of thing that lingers in the mind and heart of a young writer. And as an adult, these are the kinds of memories that I cherish.

 

I’m grateful to my dad for being supportive of my writing and even helping out when he needed to.

 

I think a father supporting a young writer, or fathers who are writers supporting their kids who take to writing, play a very pivotal role in that young writer’s life. This kind of support from a parent tells the young writer, “I see you. I value you. I support you.”

 

This kind of support not only encourages the young writer to keep writing, but it also tells the young writer that maybe they are doing something right.

Planning for the New Week

When I just started out working as a freelance writer in 1994, I spent my weekends planning ahead for the new week. I would make a list of the markets I pitched as well as brainstorm for ideas on other articles to pitch.

 

In my early days of freelance writing, I sent out several pitches Monday through Friday, hoping something would take.

 

These days, I do freelance writing differently. Instead of writing articles on a variety of topics, I stick to a niche. And instead of jumping at the opportunity to pitch an idea to a market that I feel I COULD write about if I did enough research on it, I stick to the topics that I KNOW I can write about well. I guess after going into different directions and trying everything for a certain number of years, I figured out what works best for me.

 

Not only this, but the bulk of my freelance writing isn’t about articles. It’s about essays, poems and short stories.

 

But one thing I still do even after all this time? Plan ahead for the new week.

 

I still spend my weekends hunting down new places to submit my work to, but nowadays that list is limited to just ONE market.

 

 

That’s right. Just one.

 

I have way too many irons in the fire these days, so I am not able to devote hours of my days to freelance writing like I used to. Nope; I’m either freelance writing, working on my newsletter, reading a book I have to review, writing that book review, creating new content, working on any one of my several books, working on requested edits/revisions for editors and publishers, doing book promo, doing research, or interviewing people for one thing or another. Plus there is the work I do for Twisted Dreams Press! So, no, spending hours Monday through Friday doing the freelancing is just not doable for me anymore.

 

And on the weekends, I do website updates, research for articles, working on the books, and, of course, writing whatever the heck I want to!

  

All the same, ever since I made the decision to get serious about freelance writing, I make it an effort to make time for submitting to the market that I planned to submit to for that day. Even if I don’t wanna! Sometimes, my days get so busy that I’m not able to get around to doing that until late at night. But if I’m going to be submitting a short story to a market at 11:30PM at night, then by golly, I’ll do it! Because I owe it to myself to do it!

 

And, anyway, I already had it scheduled to get done that day. A note I had made long before the day came around reminds me of this.

 

I started by writing on a Post-It Note™ what I would submit for each day of the week.

 

 

 (Note: FFW is FundsforWriters)

Then I started using my planner.

 

My planner has been a godsend in scheduling submissions and reminding me of deadlines. On any one of the given months I open it to, I can see deadlines of anthology calls, writing contests and submission deadlines written on various days.

 

 

And when I plan ahead for the new week, I’ll also use Post-It Notes on each day of the week for markets to submit to.

 

 

That right there is enough to motivate me to get on with that submission, already. No matter how tired I am, how self-conscious, how depressed or anxious I may be, I will look at that note and have a voice in my head screaming, “You’ll submit your work and LIKE it!”

 

Yes, I could step away from all of it. I could say “screw it!” and never submit anything again, but I don’t want to. Freelance writing is just ONE of the things I want to be doing during the week.

 

Plus, that call to submit can turn into an interesting experience!

 

For example, I discovered that an essay I wanted to submit to HNDL Mag was too long. I switched that submission to another market which I thought might not be interested in it. (Well, maybe they will. Who knows. I try not to self-reject!) Meanwhile, I discovered I had another essay I’d written years ago which might work better – if I just cut it a bit. (I had the mental energy to cut 200 words, not 700!) So I fixed that essay up and submitted it instead.

 

With another submission, I realized that it probably would not be a good fit. I mean, they DID have articles on writing, but they were written in a style that matched the blog’s topics. After some reading of their works published and using a little creativity, I rewrote my article in a way that fit their topic and sent it in.

 

I was surprised how these submission reminders have challenged and perhaps strengthened my creativity!

 

I have many more weeks ahead with many more markets assigned to days for me to submit fiction, poetry and nonfiction (articles or essays) to. In fact, one week alone has me submitting nothing but short stories.

 

I really enjoy doing the freelance writing this way. It’s less stressful, less time consuming, and more exciting because of all the surprising information that can pop up along the way.