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Timebinder, v. 2, issue 2, whole no. 6, Spring 1946
5
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THE "ALMOST" MAN. Your common man finds it hard properly and honestly to evaluate himself without falling into the deeps of self-pity. He so often feels that he has talents and abilities far greater in scope than are shown by the successes (which, to him, usually seem pitifully small) that he has made in life. he believes he was not always been given the opportunities of using those talents and abilities to the greatest advantage. Yet, if he be honest with himself, he knows that he has, in reality, risen to just as high a point as he is and was capable of rising. He sees far too many greatly handicapped men and women who have gone to argue that he, himself, was denied every chance, for greater success if it had been within himself for the reasons for his lesser climb. In my own case I have been doing some very serious and intensive thinking along these lines for the past several years. I have tried as honestly as may be to evaluate all of the data concerning my successes and my failures. It has been a task at once heart-breaking and heart-warming. I see on every side of me men who have far less talents, as nearly as I can tell, that I believe I possess, who have gone far above me on the ladder men call success – who have gained infinitely more in money, social, political or economic position, and the accolades of their community. Beside them I sometimes feel I am almost a total failure. Then I start remembering that in many lesser things I can honestly feel that I have been quite a successful man. This has led me, at long last, to the conclusion that I am one of the world’s countless “almost” men. Let me extend that thought. For the past twenty-five or thirty years I have desired, more than almost anything else, to be a writer. I have written three complete books, sixty or seventy short stories, over 400 poems, and innumerable articles. I have not sold a book; I have not sold a short story. I have sold three or four articles, and I have sold or had published almost all of my poems and verses, but for small sums and with only limited readership. That sounds like a failure with a big F. But is it, after all? I have studied the art of writing; and have practiced long and more-or-less faithfully to perfect myself in this manner of -3-
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THE "ALMOST" MAN. Your common man finds it hard properly and honestly to evaluate himself without falling into the deeps of self-pity. He so often feels that he has talents and abilities far greater in scope than are shown by the successes (which, to him, usually seem pitifully small) that he has made in life. he believes he was not always been given the opportunities of using those talents and abilities to the greatest advantage. Yet, if he be honest with himself, he knows that he has, in reality, risen to just as high a point as he is and was capable of rising. He sees far too many greatly handicapped men and women who have gone to argue that he, himself, was denied every chance, for greater success if it had been within himself for the reasons for his lesser climb. In my own case I have been doing some very serious and intensive thinking along these lines for the past several years. I have tried as honestly as may be to evaluate all of the data concerning my successes and my failures. It has been a task at once heart-breaking and heart-warming. I see on every side of me men who have far less talents, as nearly as I can tell, that I believe I possess, who have gone far above me on the ladder men call success – who have gained infinitely more in money, social, political or economic position, and the accolades of their community. Beside them I sometimes feel I am almost a total failure. Then I start remembering that in many lesser things I can honestly feel that I have been quite a successful man. This has led me, at long last, to the conclusion that I am one of the world’s countless “almost” men. Let me extend that thought. For the past twenty-five or thirty years I have desired, more than almost anything else, to be a writer. I have written three complete books, sixty or seventy short stories, over 400 poems, and innumerable articles. I have not sold a book; I have not sold a short story. I have sold three or four articles, and I have sold or had published almost all of my poems and verses, but for small sums and with only limited readership. That sounds like a failure with a big F. But is it, after all? I have studied the art of writing; and have practiced long and more-or-less faithfully to perfect myself in this manner of -3-
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