Those are my 5 happy things of today. What are yours?
WHY HAVEN'T I SUBMITTED THESE ASS-KICKING ESSAYS & SHORT STORIES THAT ARE JUST LYING AROUND MY OFFICE?
REALIZATION #2: It's time to get off my arse. These pieces aren't going to submit themselves. The editors of literary magazines aren't going to bang on my door begging for the essay I wrote about that god-awful smell in Shanghai that nearly sent me soaring out an open window. It's up to me. Me! "Kristin, get off your arse," I told myself this week. (And I did.)
EXTRA-SPECIAL SUBMISSION CHALLENGES FOR WRITERS LIVING OVERSEAS?BRIEF PAUSE FOR RANT AGAINST BIGGEST PET PEEVE
Hello? Hello?
We writers often wait six months and longer to get a yea or nay from a literary magazine to which we've submitted a single essay or story. Six months or longer! (In fact, last year I received a rejection for a piece I'd submitted an entire year before.)
And there are still literary magazines out there that want us to submit our work one piece to one lit mag at a time? And wait for a response before submitting to another lit mag?
My god, we'd all be dead before we were published.
HAPPY DISCOVERY FOR WRITERS ABROAD!!!
As a far-flung writer abroad, I look for literary magazines that either allow email submissions OR use an online submission manager. Two years ago (before I became a mom and I did a lot more submitting of my work), there weren't all that many lit mags that offered this option. Most accepted submissions via snail mail only. Today (pause for happy dance) there are many more. And it seems the list is growing.
Here's a quick list of lit mags that now allow email submissions OR use an online submission manager. (There are more, I'm sure. I just haven't discovered them yet.)
I've spent oodles of hours over the past five days submitting work. So far, I've submitted one short story and two essays to handfuls of lit magazines. Yep, I sent some via snail mail and some via online submission. And oh yeah, I've made a number of simultaneous submissions.
Hopefully I'll soon be letting you know that I've got a new essay or short story coming out. Fingers crossed.
AND FINALLY, A BIG THANKS!To all the lit mags that allow simultaneous submissions AND take online submissions. You rock! Writers all over the world thank you.
___
Thanks to Simon Howden for the use of his photos.
*What's a simultaneous submission? It's when a writer sends a piece to more than one literary magazine at the same time.
Here's the truth. We expat writers have some pretty hilarious, tres bizarro, mega-heart-breaking, uber-adventurous, heads-bowed enlightening, truth-revealing, "no effing way" stories to tell.
We could begin right at this exact moment telling those stories and not be finished until...well, until never. And the entire time we were telling them, you (our audience) would be bent over double with laughter, sobbing like babies, or saying "No effing way" over and over again.
After all, we brave, crazy, passionate expat writers not only travel to exotic locales for spits-and-spots of experience. We actually pack up our homes, our families, our hearts, our underwear, and our bottles of Imodium and MOVE to these exotic locales. We say, "Yeah, bring it on! I want to live in this place...as uncomfortable and confused as I am right now...and I want to...I want to..."
"You want to what?" you ask.
"I want to figure out who I am in relation to this new place. Because I was pretty damn clear about who I was in my home country, but here? Here? This place where I stand out like a sore thumb? I don't have a clue who I am or how I fit in."
"Anything else?" you ask.
"Yeah, I want to KNOW this place. Not just a little, but a lot. As much as an outsider can, I guess."
"That's a mighty tall order," you say in a John Wayne drawl because maybe you are an American.
"Yeah, but I've got a while."
Then we expat writers live in these locales for...one, two, three, four, even ten years...witnessing cultural clashes, cultural enlightenments, medicine-resistant illnesses, language conundrums, awe-inspiring kindnesses, life-changing revelations, strange fish-stomping deaths, unfamiliar burial rites, and perhaps most importantly, everyday life. We eat funky foods and compare this to that. We stare, get stared at, drop chopsticks, make friends, make mistakes, and finally, let the old shift as the new seeps in.
And of course we write about it. Because that's what we do. Because like all writers, we are obsessed with getting our stories onto the page...with working life out in pen and ink (or via the clickety-click).
But something else happens as well.
We start to change. We look in the mirror and say, "Who the hell are you?" We thumb through the myriad of stamps in our passports and say, "Who the hell am I?" We study the addresses on our mail and say, "Home?"
Because at some point...some critical point...we stop feeling like citizens of a single country...and instead feel like citizens of...well...the world.
How effing corny and wonderful and confusing and unlikely is that? There's no precedent for being a "citizen of the world." As far as I know, there's no "citizen of the world" anthem. No "citizen of the world" constitution. No "citizen of the world" rule book. No "citizen of the world" flag. There aren't any traditional "citizen of the world" costumes or sports clubs to cheer for.
Just what holidays does a citizen of the world celebrate? Tet? Chinese New Year? Passover? Christmas? And if Christmas, Santa Claus or Sinterklaas?
So once we feel this way, what do we do?
Well, you know, we're writers--expat writers-- so we do what we always do. We keep telling stories. And we find ways of sharing those stories with you (our audience)...wherever you are...back in our "home" countries...here in our adopted countries...or in the countries we touch down in along the way.
And hopefully, you (our beloved audience) read them.
_______
Thanks to Francesco Marino and djcodrin for the digital artwork.
Whenever I asked my mom for a ride when I was growing up and she couldn't (or wouldn't) swing it, I always followed my initial question "Can you take me to _________?" with the inevitable "Well, how am I going to get there?" (often accompanied by a whine and a preteen foot stomp).
To which my mom always gave the same answer: "Shoe leather express" (in other words, start walking).
Back then, that often meant that I walked to my best friend's house via the trolley tracks, the mall via the road that went past our church, and the swimming pool along one of the most commercial streets in our town. Along the way, I learned a lot. I always knew who was getting ready to have a yard sale, where the best wild blackberries grew, and how to avoid the biggest potholes. The long, solitary walks also helped me learn to pay attention...to the little things...to the aspects of a place that helped to tell its story.
So while my mom had no idea that one day I'd be living on the other side of the world writing about my far-flung life and helping others learn how to do the same, her solution to my travel woes--Shoe Leather Express--has become an important part of my writing process.
Whether I land in a new place or a place I've been many times before, I always put on my most favored, mostest comfortable walking shoes (in my case, Keens...those are my "winter" Keens [above] and my "summer" Keens [below]) and start walking.
During my first two years in China, I estimate I walked 1.75 million miles (give or take a few). In Shanghai, I walked on major thoroughfares, down old lanes, and through funky neighborhoods. I walked through the panda reserve in Chengdu, wandered about the Muslim quarter in Xian, and hiked on the Great Wall. Along every step, I paid attention to smells, colors, sounds, and the old woman selling knobs of ginger on the corner. I noted what I saw up close and what I noticed in the distance. I noted facial expressions and gestures. I gathered bits and pieces for the stories I would tell.
Sure, sometimes walking is not the easiest mode of transportation. (In Bali, I ran into so many not-so-friendly dogs, I ended up toting a big stick, and in Vietnam, dodging the scooters is not always fun.) But walking gets you up close and personal to people, food, language--the essence of a place.
So my advice to far-flung writers?
Next time you're deciding how to get from your hotel to a museum or your B&B to the beach, skip the taxi or the shuttle. Take my mom's advice and go for the Shoe Leather Express.
