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The Table in the Corner
There is a table in the corner of a small cafe where The Writer sits. It is a table for two, but one seat always remains empty, waiting. The table is next to a bookcase. The books there are dusty, but not forgotten. They have earned their dust. The ghosts would agree. The ghosts often sit in the empty chair, listening. Nodding sympathetically when they’re not nodding off. They understand the dust. Sometimes they draw their names in it. “It’s not easy,” they whisper. “This writing thing.” The Writer often responds aloud. “You’re telling me.” Someone at a nearby table will glance over, then quickly look away. A stymied writer…
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The Room in the Elephant
It lies on the kitchen table like a tipped tombstone, this year of late nights and early mornings, of exhilaration and frustration, of too much coffee and too few showers. The Froot Loops box is prostrate, casualty of another rushed breakfast. The kids are out the door. The dog is bark-begging back in. The spouse is gridlocked, Van Halen blasting him into the past if only for one more exit. His parting word to you, “finally.” You repeat the word in whisper even though you know better. This is just another beginning. But it’s done. Your first novel. Or your tenth. Drafted, redrafted, written and re-written. You run your finger…
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A Word, Please
Think of a word you don’t like – one that makes you squirm. Sure, it could be a common word like “moist” or “chalky,” but choose something edgier – something you almost never say in real life. Got it? Okay, have a seat. Your word would like to have a word with you. Word: Hey. You: Um…hey? Word: Do you know why you’re here? You: Not exactly. Word: We need to talk about me. You: I don’t think we do. Word: Oh, right. This is where you tell me you don’t need me; that you never need me. You: Um…yeah. Something like that. Word: Because there are millions of words…
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A Life of Its Own
It begins as an idea in your head. Wait, back up. That’s not entirely accurate. It starts long before that. It begins as a childhood daydream, as a parade of clouds, as a balance-beam walk along a railroad track. It begins with rock-skipping, dirt-digging, butterfly-following. It begins in beautiful words and hard words. In complaint and compliance. In monsters hiding under the bed. In hiding under the bed from monsters. It begins in the infinite space after the yes and before the kiss. In the thrill of discovery, the fear of begin discovered. The uncertainty of one moment and the certainty of another. It begins five minutes or two decades…
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Absent Brilliance
Brilliance isn’t something you can buy for yourself. You can only receive it as a gift. Some writers – I’d call them The Lucky Ones except for the fact that their brilliance is usually accompanied by a corresponding (and non-returnable) insanity – are granted the gift by the gods. Or The God. Or the universe. Or fate. (Pick one.) They’re born with it. They can’t deny it. They can’t escape it. It is woven into their being. Tell them to write something bad, they’ll try, and brilliance will whisper in the words they choose to leave out. The naturally brilliant are not perfect. Far from it. But there is an…
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Saturation Point
Sit down, we need to talk. Recently I’ve been observing some rather disturbing patterns in your behavior. It all started out innocently enough. You had an idea, then a dream, then a plan. You were going to be a writer. In the beginning, you wrote. And verily, your writing was crap. So you started hanging out in a dimly-lit bookstore, trying to look casual leaning against the shelf while stealing secrets from books on writing. You fully intended to buy one or two. Eventually. But books are expensive and you weren’t a wealthy author yet. Did you notice the stares from bookstore employees? No, they weren’t upset that you were stealing…
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Listen
A good writer is always listening. She listens to the voices of the long-dead, straining to hear writerly wisdom that only time and tide can reveal. She leans a little closer to Hemingway to discover the curious power of understatement and word economy. She plops down next to Dostoyevsky with her moral compass in hand and looks for truth in the floating needle that only points north when Fyodor tells it to. She listens to the voices of the successful. Stephen King raises an eyebrow in reply when she removes a dozen sharp objects from her purse and asks, “which would you use to kill a clown?” James Patterson and…