The Right Writer

My brother thinks he’s a writer. He caught the bug recently, and now his favorite line is, “I can’t not write,” whatever that means.

Gary got the idea to write a column for a hot rod magazine he subscribes to after the death of one of their columnists. I’m pretty sure he subscribes to every hot rod magazine in publication. His beard has been graying for years, and lately he reaches for his “readers” when he opens the latest issue. But I’ll bet he’s still more entertained by the pictures of all the pretty cars painted in crayon box colors, with shiny chrome blowers protruding from flame-striped hoods, than he is in the actual stories. You know, “I buy ‘Street Rodder’ for the articles.” Personally I’ve never understood how big tires and bellowing engines could appeal to anyone over the age of sixteen.

He sent me a draft of a story he had written, chronicling a 10-day trek to the Bonneville Salt Flats in his recently restored lime green ’48 Plymouth, with a fellow hot rod aficionado. He wanted my opinion of the story, and some advice on how to get it published. You see, I really am a writer, and he knows this. I have taken countless writing courses, entered contests too numerous to mention, placed respectably in a few, and have indeed been paid for my work.

I am always happy to share my expertise with any fledgling writer, even Gary. I willingly put aside the decades of contempt I held for the relentless teasing he and our older brother, Bill, subjected me to as a child. Curled up on the pink chenille spread covering my bed, my head buried in a book, I asked for nothing more than a little peace and quiet. From periodic popcorn pelting to the stinging spray of a transparent yellow squirt gun, there seemed no end to their infantile pranks. I can’t begin to count the number of times my mother responded to my plaintive cry, “MAAWWM!” I can still picture her running from the kitchen wiping her hands on a dish towel, screaming, “Now, you boys, leave her alone!”

But I digress.

He asked me the best way to approach a prospective publication to pitch his idea for a recurring column. He said he had had a number of letters to the editor published in one particular magazine, and thought he had developed a rapport with the editor. So rather than continue to supply his captivating turns of phrase for free, Gary decided, why not start getting paid for his “work.”

After reading his piece, I emailed a reply. “Good first draft. I like your folksy, down-to-earth style, not unlike that of Mark Twain.”

I lived to regret that comparison. He now signs all his emails, “Sam.”

My reply continued. “First, get the guidelines for submission from their website. Find out, if you can, how much they pay. You’ll need a query letter. I can help you with that. Since you want to write a recurring column, you’ll need to bundle several pieces together, to provide a sample of your work. Send them to me first to polish – you know, check the spelling, grammar, sentence structure, etc."

God knows Gary never got higher than a C- in his English class at Castlemont High in Oakland. I, on the other hand, skipped 3rd grade, excelled in English throughout my formative years, and indeed earned a multitude of certificates of excellence in spelling bees.

I patched that missive off and waited for Gary’s reply.

The next day, I received this. “I couldn’t wait, so I just sent my story idea to the editor in an email. Was that okay?”

Horrified that he had blown his first (and probably only) hope for a paid writing gig, I dashed out a quick email back.

“Slow down, Bro, you’re gonna look too anxious! The publishing world has rules, and these rules must be followed. But I think we can salvage this if we just take our time.”

Before I could hit the Send key, a new email message landed in my Inbox. Another one from “Sam.”

He had forwarded to me the response from the editor to the one he had originally sent. “Looks good. I might be interested. Send me the complete story, with pictures, when it’s finished, and I’ll be in touch.”

Damn.

It’s not supposed to work that way! What about the query letter, the polishing, the bundle? And wait a minute, he’s not the writer in the family, I am. We all have our designated roles. Bill is the artist, I am the intellectual, and Gary is...well, the middle child. A sort of place holder, a temporary distraction, until the baby, Mommy and Daddy’s little princess, is born.

Still, he was seeking my guidance. What’s a good sister to do? I couldn’t just abandon him there on the threshold of his newly discovered ambition, however unsuited to it he may be.

Before long, I was correcting spelling, unsplitting infinitives, inserting verbs where no verb had gone before, and generally spit-polishing Gary’s Twainesque works. I even started recommending other publications for him to submit his work.

When he got the check in the mail, I was the first one he called. “I owe you dinner,” he said, after he shared the news. “I couldn’t have done it without you.”

You’re darned right, you couldn’t, I thought. But I kept this to myself. After all, he’s my brother. And besides, he knows that no matter how successful he becomes, I’ll always be the princess.