On The Inbox Wormhole

As I’m continuing my writing journey and realizing my time in cyber-space is at least as consuming as my time on Earth, there’s always a place I fear to look, a place of darkness, like in “Dune.”  Only I don’t have a poison needle and a cute actor sitting across from me as I enter this strange place.  Like most people, I call it my Inbox.

Don’t get me wrong; I’m happy to get correspondence from friends and contacts I’ve made via social networking.  The great part about my Inbox is the ease of transfer of wonderful literary creations or useful advice by the network experts.  My Inbox has delivered everything from great books to fantastic beta reads; and the latter make me feel like I’m keeping the latest best secret. 

For those of us listed on more blog/social sites than we care to think about, we know the voiceless horrors of our Inboxes.  To be fair, for me this is over 90% self-inflicted.  Sure, I’ve been to the sites to “compile” my updates, but as I increase my efforts, here come more updates!  It’s truly an avalanche of information, and the biggest tragedy is lack of time of address each one to the extent I’d like to.  A worse nightmare is an anticipated email landing in my spambox, which has led to more than one situation of “Grrss” at C.C.Cole (I’m screaming now). 

Inbox hygiene is something that requires regular attention.  The only way I’ve found to manage it is to either face the message or not face it at all, period.  Leaving email crumbs to “get back to later” usually translates into “forget about completely” leading to thousands of either unopened or stagnant messages and an unclean environment.  I go ahead and download any beta reads as soon as I get them.  If I get bumped out of a group for lack of interaction, they get my vote too; throw that bum author C.C.Cole out.

As I close this post, what’s interesting about Inboxes for new authors is the wide variety of comparisons.  What, even an Inbox can be creatively stimulating?  Of course it can!  If you’re a horror-writer, the Inbox and be a spooky hidden basement, a fantasy writer can create an opening to another word with talking critters, a dark fantasy writer can create another way into hell (what’s our deal there?), and a sci-fi writer can always use the prototypical wormhole.