Seattle Sun Newspaper - Vol. 7, Issue 6, June 2003

Copyright 2003 Jane Lotter. Do not use without permission.

JANE EXPLAINS:

My brush with hysteria

By JANE LOTTER

This will come as a shock to many of you, I know, but I actually produce more than just this fun-packed, award-winning column for The Seattle Sun.

The fact is, I freelance for other publications. I do this to make extra money because, like many people in America, my husband Bob and I are paying for a house, two kids, and an African dwarf frog.

However, unlike the steady paycheck generated by my work here at the Sun, freelancing is uncertain. I write something, I send it off; maybe it sells, maybe it doesn't.

It's a lot like living on a desert island and sending out the occasional message in a bottle, except you hope the incoming tide brings a return bottle containing a nice check and a thank-you note from an editor.

So it was that I returned home one day recently and found a message on my voice mail. "Hi, this is Andrea in New York with 'American Heritage' magazine. We're running your Russian history piece in our June/July issue, and I need to get your author's bio."

Oh! Wonderful news! "American Heritage" needed my bio!

But wait. Was this wonderful news? Upon reflection, I was pretty sure there'd been a mistake. I hadn't written a Russian history piece. In fact, I was pretty sure I didn't know any Russian history.

But hang on again. Certainly, I had a superficial knowledge of Russian history. The Cold War, for example. Duck and cover. Later, that birthmark on Gorbachev's head. And hadn't I once driven through Moscow, Idaho? Hah! I was more versed in the topic of Russian history than even I realized!

My mind was racing with Slavic possibilities, though I still didn't see how I could possibly have authored the piece referred to by Andrea.

A new thought came to me. Perhaps I'd written something in my sleep. Or perhaps I'd composed it in a sort of amnesic fugue state.

This, I realized, would be both good and bad. Bad, in that it would mean I'd completely lost my mind. Good, in that it could be a valuable source of additional income.

No, it had to be a coincidence. Andrea meant to contact some other Seattle writer. Somewhere in this city there was a Russian history expert who needed to get her author's bio to "American Heritage," and I was holding things up.

I headed upstairs to my office to call Andrea and tell her she'd made an error. As I trudged up the stairs, I reviewed my life and the many mistakes I'd made over the years: Disco dancing. Investing in Beanie Babies. But worst of all why why, why, why?! hadn't I studied Russian history?

I replayed Andrea's message on my office phone. This time, however, I had a realization. Andrea wasn't saying, "Russian history." She was saying, "brush with history."

Oh, oh, OH.

I remembered something. "American Heritage" has a regular feature called My Brush with History.

Like Barbra Streisand in "The Way We Were," misty, water-color memories lit the corners of my mind; I thought back over the years, all the way to 1998. I saw myself, 10 pounds lighter and my hair its natural color, writing an essay about how I once met the silent film comedian Harold Lloyd. I saw myself submitting that essay to the My Brush with History section of "American Heritage." (I saw myself kissing Robert Redford, too, but that was the perfectly understandable error of confusing my personal life with "The Way We Were.")

I called Andrea. We exchanged pleasantries and bio information. "Andrea," I said, "I have to tell you, I submitted that Harold Lloyd piece nearly five years ago."

She laughed. "It takes us a while to get around to some of these," she admitted.

"Andrea," I persisted, "five years and not so much as a peep. Not a 'we're holding your work for possible future publication.' Not a 'hello, the editors are considering your submission.' Nothing. Five years, Andrea. If that essay could dress itself, it would be starting kindergarten in the fall."

She laughed again. "Well, we get a lot of submissions to that department."

Andrea informed me that, naturally, I would receive payment for my work. And no doubt a check will eventually appear probably in about five years.

After hanging up with Andrea, I thought about other long-forgotten manuscripts I'd sent to various magazines over the years. Might a few more phone calls be in the offing? Might even now an editor at "Vogue" or "The New Yorker" be barking to an assistant: "Get Jane Lotter on the phone! Tell her we're going to run that piece she wrote in '93! Tell her we need her author's bio, pronto!"

Ah, well. In the end, the bio Andrea and I cooked up was nothing special. Just your short, standard credit. But, truthfully, what it should have said is this: "Jane Lotter is a Seattle writer whose recent experience with "American Heritage" is proof that freelancers everywhere should never give up. Because, really, you never know."

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E-mail Jane at janeexplains@attbi.com.