I had this absolutely amazing, completely ingenious idea for a blog that was going to not only cause you, the kind reader, to blink repeatedly and with great vigor, shading your eyes from its brilliance and profundity (bonus points for word usage, por favor), but would immediately explode into an internet sensation, go uber-viral, rocket around the planet like a halo orbiting St. Peter’s blessed noggin’ and (here’s the part) eventually haul in a Pulitzer, a Nobel, a Grammy, an Oscar, and the Powerball jackpot (with play).

No kidding. It was that good: solid gold. Take it to the bank. Bingo! Bango! Boom! Mic drop.

But (and this is a big, fat but in the road) something terrible happened en route to sharing this idea with the world. Before I could get this stupendous, supercalifragilisticexpialidocious (word points?) concept on paper, I received the second dose of the Moderna vaccine. (Motto: “Moderna-Moderna, when you gonna learn-a?”)

Instantly and without warning, every worthwhile thought, and most of the crappy ones, vanished from my head. It was as if my brain was erased. Whoosh! Just like that. Blank slate.

So please be forewarned. If you have yet to let someone impale you with a long, sharp instrument and inject a not-really-tested-that-much concoction into your body, you might want to stop right now and consider the consequences. I’m living proof that there’s a good possibility (say 99.9%) that if you get that shot, you will NOT have your next great idea turned into a New York Times bestseller OR a Hollywood blockbuster movie. It just won’t happen.

**I’m living proof that if you get that shot, you will NOT have your next great idea turned into a New York Times bestseller OR a Hollywood blockbuster.**

Makes you think, right?

I wish all of the above was true. I wish I could blame my vacuous brain cavity and desperate drought of creativity on Moderna. (Alternate motto: “Moderna-Moderna, it’s really hard to rhyme stuff with Moderna.”) For that matter it would be very convenient and rather pleasing to blame my lack of interest/passion/productivity in recent months on mask requirements, social distancing, and insidious viruses in general. I’d go so far as to throw in political unrest, racial tension, and plagues of locusts in Africa. The problem is, with or without those distressing events/malevolent microscopic creatures/social trainwrecks/destructive insects, my output and mood have been, in technical, scientific terms: meh.

See, here’s the thing: sometimes writing is hard. At least, it is for me. It takes effort. You have to generate ideas, consider them long enough to do something with them, develop them, play around with them, turn them upside down, drop them on the floor, find a broom, clean up the mess, and be okay if that “great idea” winds up dying a slow, cruel death. Then you have to summon the hutzpah to go on to the next thing. Ad infinitum.

It’s kind of addictive, but not always that fun.

Hemingway once said: “There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at the typewriter and bleed.

Replace typewriter with laptop and replace bleed with bitch, moan, complain, and whimper, and that’s pretty much what I do all day, every day. For a living - with a great company that actually pays me to bitch, moan, complain, and whimper - and as a life-long side gig, ever hopeful that one of my bitchy, moany, complainy, whimpery efforts will assail the wall like an American Ninja Warrior, escape into the wild, and proliferate, returning one fateful day with great bounty, acclaim, and, of course, a dumptruck overloaded with Benjamins.

In The War of Art, Steven Pressfield put it this way: There’s a secret that real writers know that wannabe writers don’t, and the secret is this: It’s not the writing part that’s hard. What’s hard is sitting down to write.

Take my latest, still-in-the-works novel for instance. I’ve been wrestling with it for a respectable period of time. Which is writer-speak for: this freaking thing is taking forever! We are not friends. We’re like two MMA opponents - we touched gloves before the bell, and now we’re trying to knock each other’s block off. But I am not going to tap out!

There’s a secret that real writers know that wannabe writers don’t, and the secret is this: It’s not the writing part that’s hard. What’s hard is sitting down to write. - Steven Pressfield

I intentionally, and sometimes painfully, sit down and spend time every day working on it. Not always a long time, but time. That way I stay connected to it. I am not letting it get away. Because, to be honest, I actually like it a lot. It’s just frustrating because it’s progressing slowly. But that’s okay. I plan to keep at it until that last page is fini and I’ve hit command/“s” and also dumped a copy in my Dropbox, just in case Mr. Gates’ stupid, poorly designed MS Word program crashes - again.

Of course, once the second dose of the vaccine fully kicks in (8 days from now), my mental powers will probably be toast. So I have a Plan B. I’ve already decided that when/if, as is widely reported in so many reputable medical journals, the Moderna (sub-alternate motto: “Moderna-Moderna, now you be the walking dead”) turns me into a cockeyed, one-legged, rapidly decaying monster, I will keep a diary. I’m thinking book deal with Random House and movie option with M. Night Shyamalan. Hey, even zombies can dream!