Stay Stoned on Your Words

Does that word "stoned" date me? Now that states are flipping the switch on legalized marijuana sales, is my word choice old? I'm not a smoker, nor do I plan on becoming one if the voting public in my current state of North Carolina decides to legalize pot, but I want to use the right terminology.

Point is, writing should make you high. If you don't find a buzz in it, give it up, baby. It won't take you where you want to go. And, frankly, where you want to go is just royal-flush nirvana, 'cause nothing else about a writer's life will make you happy.

Stay put in the smoking-room desert, the one I've been personally wandering in for a few years now. Because the publishing territory on the outskirts of your royal-flush nirvana is wild and lawless. Breath deeply of that glorious smoke, those words of yours, because when the beautiful fog lifts and you're in the territory, because you've wandered so far off in your stupor, you'll develop a crazy-ass migraine called no-one-gives-a-shit-about-your-work.

It's then you'll start writing about getting stoned when you actually don't really get stoned. But you can't feed your habit enough, and that's how you'll know you're addicted and, wow, how did that happen?

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Trippy cycle. Crave your story, write, get stoned, fog clears, no one gives a shit. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. I've met writers who go cold turkey, set aside the ink for years, and suddenly, one day, madly crave it, and go back. I understand, but goddamn it. They should have had the strength to stay away. They went and threw sobriety away. For what? A comic essay? A memoir? A god-forsaken novella? What a freakin' shame.

What they really should stay away from is the publishing territory. Vape to your heart's content, just don't ever come down. Stay in the stoned zone. Trust me, there's nothing in the publishing territory you want. Nothing at all.