This is all to say: I just got back from a super badass writers' conference all hyped up to write my ____ and now I'm stuck doing elaborate, bullshit stretches and fussing with my heart rate monitor because I'm scared of writing. The noun in that last sentence gets a blank because it's much scarier than "thesis," or "essay" or even "collection of essays." It's a noun for something bigger and weightier, something that it always followed up by the questions of whether it's been "accepted" or "sold" or "published," and then "when," "for how much," and "by whom"?
Book. I'm scared to say book, or think it, but for the past two weeks I've been told that's what it is and wants to be, this project I'm working on, and by necessity I've had to come up with a pitch for said book, which I've then thrown around with alarming promiscuity. Now, I'm a big believer in the power of words and suggestion. I like the Jewish lore about golems, animated beings created entirely from inanimate matter, and I feel like my book is becoming-- has become-- one. I've breathed life into it just by calling its name and now it feels like the weight of expectation and the care I'll need to provide are paralyzing me. I imagine expectant mothers must feel the same.
But here's the other thing I took away from this conference, which brings together all kinds of writers from all over the country: I have a kind of awesome life for writing. People were giving me the wolf look when I started talking about it-- all the moving, all the jobs, all the hurricanes, and then the weird confluence of occupations of my dad, husband, and brother (oil rigs, fighter jets, and the FBI). It was like all the accumulated stress and adrenaline in my past had been liquified and I was squirting it around like phermone perfume-- people actually seemed jealous. Or maybe it was more like morbid fascination. Or maybe I just had something really large stuck in my teeth.
At any rate, I've taken a series of passionate admonitions to heart about how this [book] needs to be written, how it could be very interesting, how I'd better not fuck it up. I feel like a clueless pregnant teen who's stumbled into Right to Life campaign headquarters, been thoroughly lectured about how my baby already has fingernails (!), and then booted back out into the street. Something that seemed fun to daydream about has somehow lodged itself in my life and I can't ignore it.
Speaking of avoiding the mirrors, I'm not going to reread any of what I just wrote. I suspect it'll sound whiny, like "poor me, I have to actually get started on what I've said I wanted to do all my life."
