Writer's Block - an Editor is Allowed to Be Impatient Sometimes

The writer sat, drearily, at a lonely and bleary desk, quietly typing out monotonous phrases of words that meant nothing, in patterns that looked like sentences that almost made sense, without any inspiration at all. If genius was 99% perspiration, and 1% inspiration, there certainly were 99 pages of complete nothing, practically vapor, in front of the workstation. The hundredth page had better be something good. Having 99 pages of deletable material might be something to cry over, however, the author was more stoic than that.

It was time for a coffee break. When at a loss for decent words, a warm cup of stimulating beverage usually helped. Going to the microwave and heating a mug of coffee was a relaxing thing to do, although, in this town, not something to request out loud.

May and Kojiko were having it out again, a quiet war of words in the finished basement. This little battle that nobody present could hear, over a small editorial malfunction or oversight in the latest fashion column. May did not like the opinion of the editor at all, and told Kojiko this, abruptly, as the magazine was gently and soberly thrust onto a magazine table in front of her place setting at the dinner table. Their lips scarcely moving during this discussion, their harsh whispers only audible to a golden retriever, a German shepherd, and a small droid cleaning the air ventilation system.

Kojiko gestured wildly, flailing the magazine, pointing at the photos, however, her voice was softer than a whisper, a mere murmur that blended into the electronic hums of kitchen appliances and the ventilation system. This went on for several minutes, becoming almost a dance of paper and pictures, of arms and legs and glossy electric shine on magazine pages, with some mostly inaudible murmurings burbling from Kojiko's lips.

May, at last, spoke, and spoke audibly, saying, "I could write that column better than that person did. Those opinions are dated. Nobody real wears things like that anymore. Clothing like that ends up in the back room, at the rear end of a closet for fifty years. Getting more than one or two outfits like that is a complete waste - as in, one for your communion, and one for your wedding."

Kojiko stated, with a smile, "You know something, I am glad you spoke up about that. At least you finally said something pertinent to the discussion. I was wondering what was really the matter with this article, and there is a lot of validity to your last statement there."

Not much of a start, however, something, usually, something, being better than nothing. However, other times, a small start like this meant absolutely less than something. Editors were peculiar sorts, some paid advances, others did not. Writing had not been lucrative, in fact, had been an expensive craft to learn. However, something had been typed, a start, albeit a small one, onto the paper, that looked to be at least the length of a five minute story board.

If the people who saw the story board liked the tale, then, it would be passed on to a better author, or at least a more respected one. What was worse, sometimes, stories like these somehow would end up back on the author's desk, years later, in drastically altered form. One more reason to abandon handwritten notes, the writer remembered a few times when the scripts returned with other people tracing the scribe's handwriting. That had been a reason for vast charnels of wrath, while tracing the forger's handwriting back had been a source of inspiration for hours of mystery prose. Eventually, these charnels might merge, to become something on the order of Vesuvius or Krakatoa, if the other missives that the perpetrator were successfully evacuated from the office via the aqueduct known as the mail room.

The writer enjoyed sending letters back to the forger, spooking, scaring, perturbing the poor secretary after that, in a way that had caused great intra-office merriment. This scenario, having happened at least a dozen times at the publishing company, to the amusement of most of the editorial staff, had only increased the popularity of the writer, which was both fortunate and unfortunate at the same time. This writer, like most writers in the bullpen, no longer had any friends whatsoever, and had stopped sending even thank you notes to all but the closest of family members over the course of the years, not out of ingratitude, merely out of the despair of realizing a situation. The rally for damage control only left a pervasive aura of dampness around the editorial room. The author had loved the fun of sending thank you notes, and being liberated of this privilege had been a painful one.

What a paradox, to be both fortunate as well as suffering from misfortune! Both of the characters, May and Kojiko, also shared this capacity in their lives on paper, within the context of the story itself. The story would unfold, however, the characters, their similarities and differences, needed to be delineated, prior to the story going any further. These characters should be believable, palpable, yet entirely imaginary. Of course, there would need to be lots of secretarial types thrown into the work for pulp trash, who in some versions of the tale, the lesser versions, would become the main characters. However, this author still needed two solid characters for this pantheon of novel types, genres, and calibers to work around.

Kojiko would be an experienced woman of the world, thoroughly comfortable in her body, with her place in society, a pure creature of pleasure, who enjoys using words and actions to try to experience the golden way of light, very mature, although, about the same age as May, who would need to counterpoint all of these qualities for character contrast, within the context of the written work itself, at least initially.

Admittedly, the author had, at times, made the foul mistake of furthering the career of one or two of the ladies who had disdainfully left their psychic blemish about the work place, most of whom were the most attractive sort of ornament that any man could hope to be seen with. A few of these secretaries had been fed to editors, others, having survived that, needed a little bit of nurturing and assistance in order to be shown the way to the circular file, or storage bin, which was a special presentation that not even one had entertained being shown. It was most of the scribes favorite place to store work over the course of the day, nobody ever threw anything the least bit dirty in their cubicle's wastebasket, and none of us understood in the least the secretarial pool's aghast looks of terror at being shown the office wastebasket. A few of the ladies had rushed for the revolving door and not ever returned after this lame little bit of fun.

Now, May would have loved the circular file, slummed in it, practically lived by the code of the wastebasket, whereas, Kojiko would have used it as her secret vice, her little recycling box, like a bizarre Bento box from hell.

Finally, the author had a source of inspiration for the next trashy animated cartoon, Bento Box From Hell. The stars to this animated cartoon would be a small pitchfork carrying gecko, living in a child's Bento Box, a talking sushi roll slice, made of fruit leather, yellow rice and anchovies, and several talking goldfish, living in a cup of crystal clear, charcoal filter bubble tea. The child's name would be May, the owner of the Bento Box, whose best friend, Kojiko, could not handle the mere sight of this trouble-causing lunch box full of wise-cracking creatures and food that nobody should ever eat. We'll change the characters ages to about 12 for this cartoon.

Bento Box From Hell - this would need to be a cartoon appealing to pre-teens, and teenagers, people not yet ready for adult swim, who might want a little entertainment, something amusing and true about life, containing preposterous-looking characters with droll qualities of rationality and sanity that might be unacceptable from human characters in even an animated cartoon. We could keep the characters May and Kojiko in this one, without changing their names.

The pitchfork carrying gecko, named Lucifer, would be the cartoon's parent figure, the voice of dietary restriction, steering the cafeteria back to better meal choices, and frequently probing the instructor in many of the school classes for better answers to questions, as well as at times asking questions, or doing things like hijacking remote-controlled cars, little boats, radios, or other toys, especially transportation toys brought in by the school children, during boring periods in the classroom instruction. This little gecko is of course, a former unpaid employee of the school district, who escaped the pixellation factory where many geckos like himself labored without pay, creating all kinds of kanjii, romanjii, hiragana, katakana, and other alphabets. This gecko is smarter than a fifth-grader, and enjoys feeding runaway children with his idea of food, which of course, he creates from waste protein found in the soil. Most of the time, these experiments turn out to be unusual variations on food products that are ho-hum cartoon characters, things like peanut-butter and jelly striped carrot sticks, spinach-flavored donut holes, or oyster and gnat cracker sandwiches. Lucifer earns more money than the teachers at this school do by way of cloning small change and selling his variations of food products to major international conglomerates, however, Lucifer is unable to actually use this cash.

However, Nirvana, a talking sushi roll slice that bypassed the alpha tests of the research and development department at Yotsubishi, is Lucifer's protagonist and protogee. Attempting to explain everything about life, the voice of reason here is a most preposterous one. It's bad enough talking to your food, however, being the protector of a lunch box that talks back to you, aggravating fellow students and teachers alike, is May's problem, as well as her joy.

A clear titanium bottle of bubble tea, filled with sea water and two living red white and blue fish, Tiny Bright and Happy Daze, who are the most popular attendees of the school in no time, give this animated creation a little color as well as cheer.