Shorts

I've always leaned towards writing shorter things. They're like gunshots! They have to pack a lot into a little, or the bullet just sputters down into a penny at your feet. But if you get it right, you can take aim at your favourite organ and notch up a quick kill. I do really appreciate the kinda slow burn pandemic that only longer material can provide. But for my own work, I prefer assassination over annihilation.

It comes from the weight of brainstorming. If nothing else, I'm good at seeing many alternate paths and directions that any particular idea can take. That said, it's usually too many. More than half of the diverging paths are stupid dead-ends, but at least I can see the options. This works out well enough in small projects: there are a limited number of stops to the destination, so at least the convoluted network of good and bad roads are all in the same city. It's still an agonizing process in which I can dwell on a single word in a sentence for hours, but there are only so many sentences to torture. And if some serendipitous asteroid blasts the whole bastard to bits and reveals a better approach -- which happens again and again -- a two-thousand-word death count is just collateral damage.

I've tried longer projects, but they always feel like a giant chess tournament in my head. There are too many players, too many pieces, too many alternate routes any single game can take. Ideas clash at every move, every board, and nerds get into slow fistfights where they stroke their chins between puffy puffy cotton ball punches. When an asteroid hits, everyone dies and is simply relieved.

Of course, I might just need to get better at organizing my thoughts. But for now, let's keep it short.