Shortcuts? There Are No Shortcuts

I wonder if our mental attitudes for getting from A to B alter as we progress from infants to teens and on to adulthood…and then to older-adulthood?

In the pre-SatNav, pre-smart-phone era of my teens, I was the navigator for my mother behind the wheel in our second-hand Fords, traversing the width of England and Wales from Kent and back home on various family holidays.

In my hand, I usually had an American WWII Gazetteer – my dad having been a Colonel in the US Army. It was a superb road map with all the A & B roads and white tracks accurately drawn.

The M2 was avoidable, the M4 hadn’t been opened fully, and the M25 was but a dream (nightmare?) so all but a few roads had remained unchanged.

I became adept at finding the shortest route, even if that meant the exhaust dragging dangerously on the ridge of grass occupying the middle of a minor road. Shortcutting had become a life skill.

Except that, in life, there are no shortcuts. From the Jews traipsing around the desert until a generation of faith and obedience took over from the shortcutters, to most (all?) men ignoring IKEA instructions, or athletes resorting to taking illegal substances to rescue a fading career…we all know the foolishness of taking shortcuts and acknowledge the wisdom of the less glamorous side of life: patience, planning, attention to detail, the slog, adopting a ‘marathon not a sprint’ attitude to life.

I’ve yet to meet many writers who rub their hands with glee when it comes to submitting work for line editing with all the amendments and corrections that ensue, or various steps (e.g. ISBN numbering) before publication…and that ghastly word ‘marketing’…I apologise for even mentioning it. I can feel collective ACW spines shuddering away.

So, here I am, sitting in yet another North Somerset café, sipping a decent flat-white, bemoaning a lack of cooked cheesecakes, with a laptop and time on my hands to WRITE…not slog through line edits, ideas for book covers, or steps towards publication or marketing.

But the passage of time has taught me to be more patient and submit, meekly, to the process.

I’m astounded by the work of line editors (shout out to Liz Carter) who, essentially, have the skill to make our best efforts look as if we’ve studied English Language to degree level – Respect!

I look back to my younger self – always trying to get from A to B by the shortest route in the quickest time – and can still see the joy in it, but I can also see the bodged kitchen units, the lack of revision before exams, the avoidance of emotional intelligence at times, and the fruit of taking shortcuts. Disaster.

No, bring on the horrors of all the writing process, from inspiration and ideas, from ISBN numbers to inventing marketing strategies. I’m ready.

Originally: Shortcuts? There Are No Shortcuts