Mistakes

By Sally Franz

I just found out I used a typo/misspelled/non-word: I used ‘creeped’ vs. ‘crept’. Thank you spell check for ignoring to flag that one for me. All the words I intentionally want to use, you have smeared in red, this one, nada, zippo, zilch. What? You were too busy to bother to mention it. Were you off playing Scrabble with fellow cyber grammar geeks?

No mater, I caught it myself, alas too late. It was around 4 p.m. after an energy drink (of a certain vintage) kicked in when a delayed synapse in my brain fired and I had a balloon-in-the-air moment when I read a paragraph of text from my recent manuscript in the sky. “Wait? What? Creeped? I used creeped? That’s not a word”. I checked three online dictionaries hoping there was an obscure use of creeped, as in, “she creeped up on him.” Maybe there was some Old English usage or tertiary definition? But no. They all wanted to use ‘crept’ to rhyme with slept as in what my spell check was doing. All to the ruin of my newly longed for career aka Children’s Book Author. Now I fear they won’t let me near the ankle biters.

It wouldn’t seem so cataclysmic if it hadn’t been in the very manuscript I just sent to an agent. As it was, the agent in question was no doubt accepting manuscripts only under duress as part of the deal to being a speaker at an association for writers. I am sure she has no joy in her job of reading opening lines and reaching for the button for the automatic rejection letter. Though on second thought maybe she does enjoy that moment as she presses, the key and watches the SENT flag. “Thank you but this piece is not right for our house at this time” by which they mean this millennium.

UGH! No matter how many times I review a document there is always one blunder (at least) in there. That’s why I am glad to pay an editor big bucks to help me out. But this time I was flying by the seat of my pants. My editor is on vacation and the deadline was today.

Here’s the question, maybe rhetorical. Do I just let it ride or do I send another copy with “revision” on it? Now mind you, I am a published author. I know how to tell a story. But the process breaks down a wee bit in grammar and punctuation. Maybe I should just create directly with books on tape. Then I won’t have to deal with where the prepositions land and if the words are perfect. If I “creeped” up on a stranger via oral tradition I could say it was the illiterate character speaking “in voice”

Meanwhile, no one cares if I have been published in adult humor, inspirational, and nostalgia categories. When you are dealing with a new genre, you go to the back of the line. And for some reason agents usually act as if they are so above the concept of making a mistake that admitting mine to them is like saying, “Look at me, I am a jerk, please delete this revision and forget I was ever born. :0)

So here’s a more important question. When can we stop giving a rat’s patootie (yes thanks spell check for having that pop up in red) about making small mistakes? I guess the answer is when those mistakes stop costing me career opportunities and money. On that fine day I will sit back and have only one career: “Gramma”. I’ll garden, make jam and spoil the grandkids silly. It might rot my brain faster not to be in a competitive line of work, where I learn new things and have ten year goals, but something tells me I won’t care.

Sally Franz is a former stand-up comedian, motivational speaker, and radio host. She is a twice-divorced mother of two and a grandmother of three. Sally has a degree in gerontology and several awards for humor writing. She is the author of “Scrambled Leggs: A Snarky Tale of Hospital Hooey,” and “The Baby Boomer’s Guide to Menopause.”