I had never heard of Staple! before and so I wasn't planning on going at all. "We're going as a group thing," she said. I thought about it for a while. Webcomic artists would be there. "Alright." I said.
And I went.
We walked in and split our different ways. I wasn't sure what I was supposed to do at all. There were so many people. So many things to do. I only knew a handful of names and no faces. I made my way down the first aisle and glanced back and forth furtively. I stopped when I saw a Spider-man comic. Paul Benjamin. I talked to him for a long time. He had a lot of things to say. I guess you would after you spent a few years as an editor for Marvel before writing for Marvel Adventures Hulk and Spider-man and his own graphic novel. "Are you a writer?" He asked me. I laughed. "I pretend to be." He grinned. "Not like, do you get paid to write. Do you write?" "Yes." I said. "Is it a passion? Do you love it?" I thought for a second. "Yes."
"Well you need to do it every day. You have to force yourself to do it every day. Every single day. Write something. One sentence, ten paragraphs, twenty pages; just write. Do you brush your teeth everyday? Yeah. Do you shower every day? Yeah. Do you eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner every day? Well, maybe you eat a big breakfast, skip lunch, and eat a big dinner, but yeah. You don't have to think about those. You just do them. Writing needs to be like that. It needs to be a habit. It's hard to stick to something like that, yeah, but it's worth it. I write a page for my novel every single day. That's not that much. It might not even be good. But in a year? I'm going to have a fucking 365-page novel. Maybe I'll spend another few years making it not shit, but I'll have something to show for my time. And you need to do that, too."
There are a lot of good things to do out there. Let's get to it.
And I went.
We walked in and split our different ways. I wasn't sure what I was supposed to do at all. There were so many people. So many things to do. I only knew a handful of names and no faces. I made my way down the first aisle and glanced back and forth furtively. I stopped when I saw a Spider-man comic. Paul Benjamin. I talked to him for a long time. He had a lot of things to say. I guess you would after you spent a few years as an editor for Marvel before writing for Marvel Adventures Hulk and Spider-man and his own graphic novel. "Are you a writer?" He asked me. I laughed. "I pretend to be." He grinned. "Not like, do you get paid to write. Do you write?" "Yes." I said. "Is it a passion? Do you love it?" I thought for a second. "Yes."
"Well you need to do it every day. You have to force yourself to do it every day. Every single day. Write something. One sentence, ten paragraphs, twenty pages; just write. Do you brush your teeth everyday? Yeah. Do you shower every day? Yeah. Do you eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner every day? Well, maybe you eat a big breakfast, skip lunch, and eat a big dinner, but yeah. You don't have to think about those. You just do them. Writing needs to be like that. It needs to be a habit. It's hard to stick to something like that, yeah, but it's worth it. I write a page for my novel every single day. That's not that much. It might not even be good. But in a year? I'm going to have a fucking 365-page novel. Maybe I'll spend another few years making it not shit, but I'll have something to show for my time. And you need to do that, too."
There are a lot of good things to do out there. Let's get to it.
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