Things You Don't Know Just By Getting Older, Part I

Once upon a time, I was a writer. A novelist, I should say, since I have a strange resistance to writing anything short. Or perhaps it's not so much a resistance as it is that I'm long-winded and like the big picture better than nitpicky details. Or perhaps I can't help myself -- when I start getting attached to a character, say a forty-year old female character who suprises me by turning out to have a bit of fetish for not-even-out-of-college boys, I want nothing more than to keep exploring how those desires are ultimately going to lead somewhere a little shady.

Sometimes I forget how great being a writer is. It's easy to think it's not great and that's possibly because there are so many books out there - some great - proclaiming that it's not great. That's it's hard and full of "KFKD" moments, as Anne Lamott says. Sure. But it's also not a Britney-Kevin situation, where just looking at them in awful cutoff jean shorts or bad hairdos makes one want to lay face down in a red tide. There's a lot of reminders out there that it's hard, and so, it becomes hard to see that cheery, slightly cultish ray of sunshine poking through the process.

I had a conversation with an old professor a few nights ago, a guy who is now my colleague. I see him in the hallways and we always toss out last names, sometimes arm punches, but we haven't had lots of leisurely time to chat. But I caught him on the lamb from advice-seeking juniors and took the opportunity to ask him about anthologies. Now although all evidence points to the contrary, this doesn't make me the world's lamest person. I'm teaching three sections of literature next semester, haven't done it, and hate anthologies. But, because it's an intro class and because I can't think about putting together my own packet right now without the whole red tide scenario, I decided I would go with the monolith and be done with it. Sadly, few anthologies have my favorite short stories, such as Russell Banks' "Sarah Cole," but at least I found one that still offers Melville's "Bartelby the Scrivner." Point being, I was all ready for an anthology bashing session, but my collegue/professor wasn't having any of it. He did not want to hear my anthology-junkie-backlash. He wanted to hear about my stories, my own writing, and what I was doing with it.

There's a funny thing about being a writer, or at least, a person who actually tells others that he/she is a writer. It's a commodity at a party -- people always want a detailed summary of what your story or novel is "about." But, on a day to day basis, among my friends and family, I have very few people who ask me, "So, how's your writing going? Are you working on anything right now? Are you reading any time soon?" Perhaps it's just assumed that my writing is always going. Perhaps it feels invasive to ask any kind of artist what they're working on. Maybe it's the whole I-don't-exactly-know-how-to-put-this-into-words thing. But the people who ask me on any kind of regular basis how my writing is going are Russ, Eileen from church, and this collegue-professor of mine.

And the truth is, my writing has not been going. I have been using this blog and my reviews as my only form of writing, which is still some sort of practice, but not the kind of practice that this old professor of mine was hoping to hear about when we talked a few days ago. He wanted to hear what stories and chapters I was sending out, what nonfiction pieces I was submitting to journals and literary magazines. I think he wanted to believe that I was not just one of those MFA students who gets the degree and then, stops writing. But sadly, I haven't been much in the creative way at all for a while. It's painful to admit that because I never thought I would be one of those writers who didn't write. I never thought the "hard, no time, KFKD" part of it would ever eclipse the "cheery, cultish" part of it. And yet, here I am: No ray of sunshine, just the horrible jean shorts.