Submission

"Submission," a term used for sending material for the consideration for publication, has a number of other not necessarily related meanings that do not necessarily correlate with this activity, but I cannot help but think of those other meanings. A few years ago, as the faculty advisor for The Mockingbird, the literary arts magazine composed by students at East Tennessee State University, I had to explain to an otherwise intuitive student that posters reading "Submit to the 'Bird" could have unintended results. The answer, of course, was to make the poster even more forceful, by adding a jabbing, pointing finger to indicate the absurdity of the word's ambiguity.

So, I am aware of these meanings as I have made a recent challenge to a couple of friends that we would send at least three poems out for consideration by the end of the week. I have plenty of other writing to do--I have a co-editor who has been fairly patient in my finishing one essay in particular--but I am also thinking of the various other writing that requires my attention, such as developing this quasi-informal blog entry to get myself warmed up for even more writing later tonight.

I find a contrast in this approach to finishing the writing. Part of me argues that I need to go ahead and complete the routine forms, recommendations, and reports so I can devote more attention to the creative, scholarly material, and I tend to hold that as a key position, so I grind that material out. It will be correct and carefully crafted, but it will also be plain and virtually untraceable to me, except for its being attached to an e-mail I send. That product should have those characteristics, though, because the mundane processed writing does not need to have a specific identity behind it. I can concentrate instead on the more personal material, the essays and creative writing that I want readers to identify with me.

I am concerned about having a lot of projects in the works at once, but I have had to become accustomed to performing many jobs at the same time. I contrast my mother's cooking style with that of one of my aunts. My aunt notoriously would cook only one food item at a time; a big meal would take her hours, and we sometimes risked food poisoning as the first-prepared foods waited on her counter for the remaining dishes to be complete. My mother, on the other hand, can have all the stove eyes, the oven, a crock pot, a convection oven, the usual oven, and a food processor all going at the same time, and the food is always good, and there's always plenty of it, too. I would not have six or seven writing projects going at the same time, but I am relatively accustomed with two to four, knowing that if I get stuck in one, I can move another along.

So, Roxanne, if you happen to be reading this blog, I am working on the Merle Haggard essay, and I am outlining the Johnny Cash one, too. Judy, I will have that faculty activities report to you in a couple of days. Catherine and Adam, I am polishing those poems while waiting in parking lots for my kids to come out of school. I will not forget the class prep, either.

By the way, please get a look at the 2010-2011 issue of The Mockingbird by clicking this link.