I won’t embarrass him by mentioning his name, but several years ago a reader of my book befriended me here. In addition to sending me newspaper clippings/stories from southern Oregon, he & his wife sent my son wonderful gifts—a homemade quilt, obsidian, geodes, pine cones. (1/2)
Though we have never met or even spoken on the phone, I consider them family friends. Their wholesomeness & warmth mean the world to me. I say all this by way of encouraging you, my fellow struggling writers. Write your books. You have no idea what might happen next.
Learned today that my kid's beloved kindergarten teacher has been moved to hospice care--mere weeks after diagnosis of an aggressive cancer. Hey friends: This life is going to take back everything it ever gave you. Don't wait to be happy.
It's not how well you write. It's how well you revise. The real darling you have to kill is your ego. The version of yourself who willingly volunteered to write slop so you--these days-months-years later--might come along & redeem it: bless that fool.
Because my son is approaching shaving age, my wife wanted to know: Who taught me how to shave? What was the experience like? As a GenX person, this seemed magical to me—the idea of being taught a life skill. No, I watched my dad. I watched TV. I told no one & just figured it out.
Every so often you get reminded of why it matters that you write. Case in point from
@TheSunMagazine
. My little essay about making coffee for my wife made its way to a group of incarcerated writers, who, in an act of generosity, began a ritual of making coffee for each other.
There are four 13-year-old boys in my house. If we drank every time one of them said “Bro” or “Ohio,” we’d all be dead. I don’t k ow the significance of “Ohio” but it is apparently hilarious.
Friendly reminder for my fellow writers: You have no idea who is waiting for your words. Who needs your words. The worlds of friendship & warmth & love your words can unlock.
There is still plenty of magic in this broken world. Touch it. Be touched by it.
Your writing will change the world. I don't mean the words, most of which will gather dust or get thrown away. I mean the discipline of putting sentences on the page, what that does to the heart & mind with which you meet your life.
It makes me sad when a student uses Chat GPT in an essay: 1) The writing itself is terrible; 2) Confirming it's AI wastes my time; 3) My annoyance at the student & the guilt it trips in me for not crafting an AI-proof assignment; 4) & knowing this is all a losing battle.
My ideal writers group: We meet early on Saturday mornings, at a diner, & sit in a booth with breakfast, & the only rule is no one can talk about writing.
I am so excited to share this essay with you all. It’s a cornerstone piece in my new collection. Thank you, always, for reading & sharing. I’m grateful for the community of writers here.
I think part of the reason so many students use ChatGPT on their writing assignments—even when expressly forbidden—is that in our fetish for standardization we have already asked/encouraged them, in a thousand ways, to become little robots.
General reminder to nonfiction writers: 1) It may not be possible or advisable to try to tell the whole story; 2) Fragments may be more interesting—rhyming actions, patterns, sequences; 3) Telling the whole story won’t save you; 4) You don’t need saving.
It’s not the hardest thing I’ve ever done, but listening—just *listening*—to my 13-year-old talk about school, sadness, boredom, anger, etc, without trying to fix everything with words ranks right up there.
Non-writers don't understand. One day you can write easily, the next you can't. You feel like a fraud, a waste of space, an idiot. You flirt with giving up. Then here come the words again, like a tomcat come home, nonchalant, proud of itself, wondering what all the fuss is about.
This is Just To Say
I have eaten
the blue checks
that were in
your bios
& which
you were probably
thinking
weren’t nutritious
Forgive me
my ego is starving
so jealous
& so huge
One of the challenges of memoir is you think you already know the story. You may know what happened or most of what happened. But what it means is something else. Likely something much scarier.
A scene from Mad Men I think about all the time is when Don & Betty took the kids for a picnic in the park & afterward just left all their trash their without one thought of picking it up. That is how you reveal character.
My poetry students were like, "Steve, will you read us one of your poems on the last day of class?" I was like, "Um...I don't really write poems." But then I wrote them one. Hope they like it.
Got rear-ended taking my kid to school. We are bruised up & a little freaked but ok. “This is my first time riding in an ambulance,” he cheerfully informed the EMT.
Hold your people. ❤️
My 16-yr-old nephew shows no interest in getting his driver’s license. Is this indicative of a larger trend of folks waiting until they’re a little older? What are you seeing?
Before we all lived inside our phones, I used to look at cheap atlases & flip through the pages reading town names, tracing rivers, wondering about all the lives reduced to little black dots. Had this dream of disappearing somewhere nobody knew me. Still sounds kind of nice. You?
On this day 8 years ago I discovered a letter in my adjunct mailbox at University of Nebraska letting me know I wouldn’t be needed next semester. No phone call. Not even an email. A letter after the semester had ended.
It’s your dad here. Bad things happen all the time, & sometimes—maybe a lot of the times—there’s not a damn thing you can do about it. All the more reason to love as fiercely as you can & be gentle with yourself. The world needs more people like that. You’re a good kid.
My kid raged last night & lost his screen privileges—except for a book club he does with his friend. They are chatting now. His friend is reassuring him that everybody gets mad sometimes, that there’s plenty to do off a screen, suggesting they write a story together. 😭😭😭😭😭😭
My son on Zoom with his speech therapist.
Her: What do you do when you get mad?
Him: I yell & cry.
Her: Do you have anything you could kick? Like a box?
Him: Sometimes I swear using words my dad always says. The S-word. The C-word.
Me from the other room: THE C-WORD IS ‘CRAP!’
My son’s school gives kindness homework:
-Write someone a thank-you note
-Tell someone they are special
-Offer to help cook dinner
-Offer to help with the dishes
-Donate to a charity
-Clean up a mess you didn’t make
& I’m assigning this homework to you, Twitter friends.
There are plenty of essays by people who messed up their lives & have massive regrets. Where are the essays by people who sacrificed & made good choices & regret their lives? I want to read those.
8 years ago today
@Orion_Magazine
published an essay of mine w/ an illustration by Sandra Ure Griffin. That’s my son in the dogwood tree. That’s the owl I’d hear in my 3 a.m. dejection. Let me tell you—this kind of care & skill & attention to detail is such a gift.
Reminder: Write to the writers whose work moves you. A little note even. The power of the small gesture, folks, can break the day wide open. Theirs & yours.
My son (13) saw a letter to the editor in The Sun that mentioned an essay of mine. “Dad, it must feel nice to be known like that. That’s really heartwarming. I’m proud of you.”
In case you need me, I am dead.
Kid & I are playing blackjack this rainy morning & swapping stories. I’m telling him about the great grandparents he never met; he’s telling me about Egyptian gods in the book he’s reading. It’s all one story.
Royalty statement arrived today. Sold 154 books last year. Not too bad for a quiet little memoir from a university press that came out in 2010. Thank you to everyone who has read it & passed it along over all these years. Means the world to me. ❤️