Gone Fishing · 2 November 2007
During this first year of writing my weekly column, there has only been one time that I wanted to forget it. This week. I have been so busy with life that I really just wanted to be able to put out a column that contained only the words, “Gone Fishing.” But I could not do it. I felt it was a copout so I am sitting here pounding the keyboard getting something written for my self-imposed deadline that is looming. Unlike the mom and pop stores of yore, I cannot just hang out a closed sign and disappear for an afternoon.
I suppose that I really could do it. I could just post a two word column that says I am out fishing. I do not have editors or publishers breathing down my neck pressuring me to meet my deadline. There is nobody saying I need to finish so that I can feed my family. So I suppose that I could take the week off.
But then again, I do have readers. And I have made an implicit contract with them that I will write my column each and every week. Regardless of how I feel. Even if I actually only have two or three imaginary readers that read my column, I must write it for them and for myself.
It is a good thing that I have imaginary readers with which to keep my implicit contract. I probably could not keep up with the column if I knew I was the only one reading it. And unlike the professionals who work at traditional print newspapers, I cannot really take a vacation from my column because at the very least, my imaginary readers and I expect my column to show up every Friday at midnight. And so I write.
One day, I am hopeful that I can be caught up on my writing. I hope that I can be ahead of my self-imposed deadlines. I hope that I can have an inventory of finished columns instead of a head full of ideas and a file of partially finished columns. I hope that I can continue to fulfill my implicit contract with my readers. Whether they be real or imaginary.
Still, I suppose there may come a day when I publish that two word column that just says, “Gone Fishing.”
© 2007 Michael T. Miyoshi
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