I wrote this in the Costco Parking Lot

I'm writing like the building's on fire. I'm writing like it's too late. I'm writing like she’s already put me in the ground.

I should’ve been publishing books for decades by now. I should’ve been writing out of the womb. Why am I too late? Am I too late?

I spent 20 hours this week learning about writing craft. I still don’t know what onomonopeia is.

In Brasil, I dated an English teacher who had me take his class’s placement test. I scored beginner/intermediate at my own language.

I laughed. It had a point tho. I don't actually know what an adverb is.

Do you know what an adverb is? I've forgotten the concept dozens of times, but the definition doesn't matter. Only the art does.

Someday, I’ll lose the quick intelligence needed to craft a story that feels like ‘me’. Someday, the words will slow, then stop. Maybe I'll have to learn the meaning of an adverb then.

But for now, I'm a prize fighter in the ring. Like, come at me! I'll win every time.

Yet there always comes a day where the prize fighter slips.

Someone new enters the ring. Someone young and spry. Someone who started writing out of the womb.

It's not too late for her.

Just a one shot KO and she's on to the next. Bestseller by eighteen. Legend by thirty. Tomorrow she won't even remember my face.

No one will.

She laughs and sets the building on fire.

PS: 3rd book is coming along. 125,000 words on the page- jumbles of muscle without bones or tendon, skin or blood. I can’t tell you if it’ll be good or not.
I can only tell you that, even if I’m late, at least I’m in the ring.