"Just F***ing Start..."

It's the key to everything. Including finishing.

I spent my lifetime preparing to write the manuscript.

Actually, I spent a lifetime talking about writing the manuscript. It was always an idea, something I would tackle one day. And so, a lifetime sped by. There was oatmeal to spoon into tiny mouths, and tantrums to tame. And there were various bosses to treat likewise. They can be so fussy when they’re hungry or smelly!

You can occupy a full lifetime that way, as I spent nearly a lifetime learning. The reason God laughs when s(he) hears about your big plans? Because s(he)’s heard it all before. Talk is a devalued currency, because way too much of it circulates.

And I have released my share of that gassy effluent, in an attempt to distract myself from the fact that I was doing everything but writing. I was advancing my magazine career, learning to be an editor, contorting myself around various bosses, becoming a boss myself, and contorting myself around my daydreams of a writer’s life.

But does anybody actually make a living at writin…