Tag Archives: writing

Friends, it’s been a while.

I could lash all my apologies together like a raft and try to paddle the gulf, but I think I’ll just jump right in where we left off.

I finished another draft of my book. If you know me in casual life, that’s probably what I say every time you see me. The other night, I went out to celebrate and friends asked me: Is this your third book? Fourth? No, no. Still the second. They said — I thought we already celebrated this book? Yes. Submitting a book is like throwing a very large boomerang at New York City. You hope when it comes wheeling back it’s not so heavy with corrections it takes your head off.

Most people think of publishing as a HIT SEND kind of situation. It’s really more of a RETURN TO SENDER situation.

You send. You celebrate. Later, in the quiet, ears ringing from the popping of corks, you lie alone. You listen for your draft out there, in the wild. You cup hand to ear, wondering — how did that boomerang land out there in the big city?

What you hear is as quiet as wind whispering through cedars.

When the draft arrives, you just keep throwing it back at New York until it finally returns to you as a bound book. This is your final RETURN TO SENDER moment. This does not mean your novel is properly finished. It just means your publisher is done helping you fix this story.

I celebrate every toss of the boomerang. For me, celebration is essential to the practice of writing. Progress with a book can be so intangible, sometimes you must build yourself a trophy out of beer cans. Climb on your desk and call it Kilimanjaro. Shout your private achievements to the ceiling fan.

You will wonder, aloud and alone, if the book will be successful. You will wonder, aloud and alone, what success is. Whether you choose to measure success with money or peer recognition, you’ll eventually learn – as George Saunders once stated – “success is a mountain that grows as you climb it.”

That’s good, isn’t it? Success is a mountain that grows as you climb it.

I’m just wrapping up my second book, which comes with its own specific challenges. While writing a second novel, you may recall every disappointing second album a band ever released. But it would be a mistake to dwell on these albums. Or listen to them.

Anne Lamott wrote: “Avoid looking at your own publication in the mirror.” She also said:

“Sometime later you’ll find yourself at work on, maybe really into, another book, and once again you figure out that the real payoff is the writing itself, that a day when you have gotten your work done is a good day, that total dedication is the point.”

Ah, it’s true. It’s so true I want to greet Anne Lamott at an airport, running with balloons.

It’s a lot of emotional work to write a book. You get wrung out, leaning into that computer screen, changing that hyphen to an ellipsis and then to a period and no, back to the hyphen and all the while beating your heart against the page. A lot of crying. It makes me think what’s called “a good cry” is somewhat defined by the duration of the crying. I’m healthiest writing about 3-4 hours a day. For this book, some days were significantly longer. Eight hours. Ten.

If I work too hard, for too long, I get arrhythmia. Tachycardia of the brain.

When I finished the latest draft, I didn’t know how to stop. My whole body had readjusted to a new schedule of endless working, heightened emotions. Hummingbird heart. Stay up late, wake up early. Is this book good? Is this book done? Keep writing. Keep worrying. Finally, very late one night, I hit send. Submitted the book. Shipped off. Gone. I still couldn’t convince my brain to stop.

The hamster had left the wheel. But the wheel was still spinning.

I needed a reset. My family and I flew back to the Midwest during winter break. This is a DSM-recognized sign of temporary mental illness, flying to Illinois in January.

In Illinois, I did not work. I FORCED myself to not work and it was like a Trainspotting detox situation but instead of creamed corn and a bedpan I had my mom’s deviled eggs and endless appetizers and the baby did not crawl on the ceiling but just on the ground. I played video games. Bizarrely, watched TV. I taught my son to play Magic the Gathering.

All the while, body and mind slowly remembering – there are other ways. Different tempos, paces, patterns of breathing. Other worlds to move through.

My hometown felt like a very different world. A real Midwestern Main Street with awnings and a barber pole. People who owned shovels and might get into a car to drive the distance of one small city block. It’s so cold, maybe you agree to get in the car to drive one small city block. Corn stalks shrunk to stubble in winter fields. Gray horizons and the white-noise rush of highway traffic. Good handshakes. Vegetables, a pale shade of green. TV in the background like flashing wallpaper.

I played cards. Ate. Ran on a treadmill so I could eat more.

It worked. I slept. Reset. Detoxed. My last day in town, I printed my book in a hotel lobby, took it to my favorite 24-hour truck stop, and read it like the work of a stranger. I could see what needed to be fixed. And when I went home to Oregon to fix it, the final draft felt like a gift.

That had never happened before. It felt like dessert.

Then, just days ago, I was seized by epiphanic, spontaneous joy. Just sitting at my desk – book not quite done, but getting there, and the sun lanced through the clouds and my kids were at school just an hour from pickup and suddenly the reality of life settled around me – the trees, that little spot of sun, kids to pick up, a worthy project to labor on. The day stretched out like a runway. It all felt laid out like a beautiful banquet. I smiled and smiled and wrote in Sharpie on white paper:

YOU HAVE ONLY THIS WHOLE, BEAUTIFUL LIFE.

All around my office, if you look, you will find bold black Sharpie declarations smattering the room, but that’s one of my very favorites. I’m staring at it now. I believe it, and hope you believe it and chase it and can feel some of your days like runways, some of your existence like a banquet, and I’ve missed being in touch, but I’m back.

It’s good to be back. Thank you for reading. If you have time, drop me a line and let me know how you’re doing out there!