Guest Author: Donna Hole

Paper Fetish
April 2010
Vol. 1, Iss. 4
News Paper Origami Dragon Monster
I don't watch a lot of reality TV, but I like Intervention and Hoarders. I can definitely relate to hoarders, though my house is not that cluttered. But I gotta say I'm a paper hoarder. I have printed novels sitting in cabinets that are three or four revisions old. I write things down on pieces of paper, and threaten everyone in the house with deadly harm - ok I scream like a banshee when irritated - if they touch it, or move it. God forbid anything gets thrown away.

I may not know where I left my keys to my car when I came in late Friday night, or where I left the checkbook after keeping the PG&E and Internet running; but I certainly know where I left every piece of paper with every bit of info I need to refer to later for my novel. No matter how many years old it is. Yes, it moved with me; I just have to find the unpacked box I saved it in.

General rule in my house: don't touch that piece of paper.

Dishes in the sink, food wrappings and paper plates in the trash. How long are you going to keep that empty soda can on your dresser? Can't you see the trash is overflowing? Dirty laundry goes here, clean gets folded and put in your drawers. What's that piece of paper? Are you sure you took it out of your pack? How long ago? Did I write on it? Where was it before you picked it up? Put it on my desk, I'll deal with it later.

A few days ago one of my older son's walked by me as I sat at the computer and stared at my e-mails. "God Mom, don't you ever throw anything away?" Yes, I answered. He rolled his eyes and walked away, obviously unconvinced after he confiscated my mouse and scrolled down the list and saw the original sent dates. I picked up a piece of paper from the wobbling stack on my printer and threw it away. He wasn't impressed. So I tackled the e-mails.

Can't trash it unless I read it, several times over, to be sure it's unusable for anything but to make me smile. Ah, what's this? An e-mail within an e-mail asking my feedback on a revised chapter for a critique buddy. I've never seen this before. (Damn g-mail and their neat numbers cataloguing of reply e-mails.) Oh, how exciting. It's only two weeks old.Stacked papers in folder

So I read, and reply. Glowingly, I might add. I was rather pleased with my response. A bit later she responds. It goes like: Thanks for the feedback. I thought maybe you didn't like it, or got to busy. Or maybe it got relegated to SPAM.

Nope. It just got lost in my own private slush pile.

So I culled through all the e-mails in my inbox. Again. Looking for anything else important that got lost. Forgotten. Would Publishers Clearing House send me an e-mail if I'm the $10 million winner? Did that last agent I queried send me a second e-mail saying he'd made a mistake sending the automatic rejection and wanted a partial or full after all?

Nah. And I even double checked the spam to be sure. Is my e-mail account pristine and waiting for new arrivals? Well, its always up for new admissions. Not like I use all that storage space anyways, right? The newest submissions on top, announcing their presence in bold. As long as I don't open them, they'll always be new, potentially exciting. And if I open them and forget to respond; well, I can always read them later, when someone says I've held onto them too long.

Same son also borrowed my memory stick and asked if I wanted him to clean out the files, make a little room. Can you guess what that answer was?
Donna Hole is an aspiring commercial fiction writer. She has completed all three novels for a trilogy, though only the first novel titled NOT HER MOTHER’S FATE is ready for publication. Donna also has written several short story thrillers, none of which has been published to date; and has recently started a fantasy novel. Read her complete biography [here].


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