"You should write more."
I write a lot. Today I wrote 8900 words.
They will never see print, and when published online will not have my name on them. I suppose it is better that way; they are not exactly masterpieces of insight or brilliant ideas that will change the world. 8900 words a day- that is more than most people write, I suppose, but those people own what they write and I do not. Not the articles, not the print ads, not the television or radio commercials, not the billboards- except, of course, in the rare instance that one of them wins an award, and my name appears engraved on the trophy, something that has not happened in five years- and especially not on the books and so-called "autobiographies" I have ghostwritten for important people who are important enough to have their lives written down but are too important to write about their own lives.
I only remember having my name on something I wrote back when I wrote little articles for a newspaper, and radio dramas for a local station. Other than that, my name has appeared on something I wrote exactly three times in my life: the first on a short story written at the age of six, the first time people called me a writer; once on a television movie I wrote (I would have much rather it wasn't, it was that bad), and recently on the film I wrote three years ago, and finally showing now.
The film has my name on the credits, but is not credited to me; the producer had the bare bones of an idea, a good location (the island of trash) and a third of a screenplay that did not work, so she gave it to me to write. So I wrote it, but it still isn't mine.
There is a sign you often see in the front of neighborhood stores and mini-marts around here, often handwritten, that says, " Your credit is good, but we need cash."
Credit is good, but I need cash. I wonder, sometimes, when that started becoming my philosophy- I am very sure it was around the time I accepted the fact that I was a mercenary.
It doesn't matter, I guess. Being a mercenary isn't such a bad thing- I've always said so. But sometimes I wonder how it is to have something you know you need to write, to have words bursting to be said, a story that needs to be told, something that burns inside of you that makes you forgo the urgency of whatever other jobs are in your inbox and the potential of a few extra dollars because it just needs to be done or you can't breathe.
I wonder.
Maybe it will happen to me one day.
But then that's what I also say about true love.