Tree Trunk Legs.

Yesterday, I spoke to a man, and left the conversation really irritated.

He is one of those guys who speaks just to hear his own voice. It doesn't matter if everything he says is condescending and rude. What matters is: Someone is listening, so so he thinks he needs to go on. When in fact, he really needed to shut up before I kicked him. And we're not talking in the shins, either. We're talking...big fat kick, with all my fat girl strength, between his ugly tree trunk legs.

Ok, so here's the set up:

This is a guy I go to church with. Now, I don't usually offer that I am a writer to people at church. Not because I am ashamed, because I am actually quite proud that I've written four books. But I hate this question:

"Oh, you're a writer? What have you written? Might I have read it? What is it called?"


Basically, assuming that I am a published writer, and that I've got something out there in paper form for them to read. This becomes frustrating and humiliating, because I am, as of yet, unpublished. And therefore cannot offer them a copy of my "book" to read, unless they want to take a giant three ring binder full of copy paper. Which, as I've been told, resembles reading a book in Fred Flintsone's time, all big and awkward, and such. I know some authors live like they are published even when they aren't, but that's not me. I feel to silly to act like I am a star when I am not!

So it get's sort of embarrassing after that...

"Well, actually, I'm unpublished right now, but actively working on getting published, and writing more every day!"


To which they usually respond with:

"But you said it was your 'job'."


To which I have to come back with the usual explanation, and I hate having to explain it to people. Did friends harass Picaso this much when he was sitting around painting all the time? I hope not....

"Well, it's my business. And without a product, I have nothing to try and sell. So I have to continue making a product in the hopes that I will eventually sell it."


And this is the point in the convo when people usually look at me like I am a slacker. I hate that. Let's see some of you numb nuts out there put your heart and soul into a book that is going to be rejected and picked apart by professionals who have read only 2.5 pages of it before tossing it out and insulting it to shreds!? Sheesh...

But, I digress...

Alright, so anyway...I am sitting in the hallway at church, plotting, ironically enough, because the class I usually go to is full and going to it makes me want to bang my head against a wall anyway, so I am basically hiding in the hallway. Then along comes Mr. Know it all, a.k.a. Tree Trunk legs. (I will refer to him as Tree Trunk legs henceforth.) and he sits down right next to me, which isn't surprising. He is one of those people who will sit right on top of another person on a couch, even though there are 12 other chairs for him to sit on. I hate that. Don't come in my bubble, dude. I mean it.

Now, in previous conversations, he's told me, after finding out that I am an aspiring writer, that he fancies himself a writer, too. Apparently he's started at least a dozen books, but never finished them, and has not yet entered the world of submitting manuscripts, queries, and synopsis' to agents. *Snort*...Amateur.

Get rejected a few times, dude, then come back and sit close to me on the couch.

Okay, so he starts rambling on and on about writing, etc, dropping names of author's that I've never heard of, and then I mention that I recently went to a conference, and he asks what it was called, and says that he didn't even know there was a conference the weekend before. (Mind you, he is appalled, as if the conference Gods should have asked him permission first.) And so I tell him it was a Romance Writer's conference, and that is where the curtains shut and he tunes me out.

"Well, I didn't know about it, because I don't read or write that genre and never would."

Um...okay. Not many men do, but whatever. So I mention that I've decided to table my current book and work on a new idea I've been kicking around for a while, and that I am planning to follow all the rules and apply everything I learned through the workshops at the conference. Give those agents something they will like!

"Well, that's fine. I mean, some might call you a 'sell out', but if it gets your foot in the door..."

Wait, wait, wait....did he just call me a sell out. Mind you, we're talking about a genre he hates, anyway, but now he thinks I am a sell out because I am following the rules and making a book that agents and editors might actually accept? This is the point at which I got pissed off. Then, for the icing on the cake, he says this:

"I think that genre is mostly just for people looking for pornography, but don't want to go out and buy a video or a magazine. I mean, it's good for you, because without them, you wouldn't have a genre, but..."


Okay. So now he thinks I write porn? Because I don't. But even if I did write Erotica, would it be this dudes place to congratulate me on selling out and writing porn for the masses? I don't think so! This was an awful conversation. He went on to tell me that as soon as he had the "Time", he would work on having his books published, and...

Now, mind you...getting your work published is a job in and of itself. You have to devote yourself to the process completely, treat it like a career, and focus all of your spare time on it, if you want to ever be published! It has to become the most time absorbing job you AREN'T getting paid for, before it will ever pan out into a published novel. And I am doing this because I have the time? Oh, I could have punched him.


Um, Tree Trunk legs...I have 4 kids and a husband. I do more in a day than you do in a week, and you and your mouth technically work overtime.

I hate it when my genre is insulted. If it is a worthless genre, then how come more books get published in the Romance genre than any other genre? Because there is a market for it. In other words, Tree Trunks, readers. Don't diss something you know absolutely nothing about, and let me know how things pan out for you....when you have time to get published.

Douche bag.

Brooke Moss.