THESE THINGS TAKE TIME
Finish Your Draft!
Medium is hosting a (Finish Your) Draft Day
“Do you have an unfinished draft sitting in your queue?”
Hahahahahahahahaha…….
It’s quite surprising that the published number is actually higher than the number of drafts.
On April 6th, (Finish Your) Draft Day recently entered my consciousness. “Why not?” I thought.
This particular no-longer-a-draft you are reading began when I first heard about draft day. Yeah, I know. Not very impressive procrastination. But that “208” listed above? Many of them go back years.
But rest assured there are more antiquated ones. I recently tried to process (shitcan) a box of old stuff that has been sitting in the basement for the years since said stuff was moved from another basement. There I found folders full of drafts from 50 or so years ago. At this late date, they are much like letters from a young self to an old self.
A few of those might be worth getting around to finishing. Now THAT would be an impressive achievement stimulated thanks to Medium’s Draft Day (MediumDraftDay.com). I’ll have to ponder that, wondering if the joy resulting would be worth the effort required.
But the finally finished draft I was happiest about was in 1973.
On Jan. 27, 1973, the Paris Peace Accords were signed and U.S. involvement in Vietnam was done. Defense Secretary Melvin R. Laird announced, “I wish to inform you that the Armed Forces henceforth will depend exclusively on volunteer soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines.”
The draft was finished and 19-year-olds breathed a collective sigh of relief.
Let’s have a moment of silence for those conscripted who did not return.