And I wouldn’t have it any other way….
I swear, the stories I’ll have about the actual conceptualization and subsequent publication of this book are far more fascinating than the book itself. For example, the night before my book comes out, I went to my old job to help my former supervisor who needed someone to do custodial work a couple of nights while he is on vacation. It was nice to see everyone, it was cool to have so many people congratulating me on the book and asking me to sign their copies when they get them (that is a WHOLE other story altogether) meanwhile? I cannot help but joke that it’s a humbling experience. The next morning you are an author, the night before? You are being congratulated while cleaning shit and blood of off a person’s bathroom floor. Before I did my shift I e-mailed a bunch of libraries to figure out how I can get my book on their shelf, one responded by telling me that typically they only accept books that have been reviewed. They have a fiction review committee and if I want to donate a copy, they’ll review it and if they don’t care for it? They will donate it back to me *tugs at his tie Rodney Dangerfield style* Woah, tough crowd. Another asked how long the book took me to publish as she herself has a lot of stories she thinks would make a great book. “Twenty-years,” I answered. The look went from excitement to total disappointment. Its hard to be a writer. This is why I would love to teach on the college level, I took a lot of classes with people who thought that to publish a book all you need is a good story and some talent. I don’t want to burst anyone’s bubble, but you need a hell of a lot more than a story and talent. That’s not me being cynical or harsh, because you need the drive and the passion to know that rejection is a constant. Do you still want to be a writer knowing you’re more often than not going to be rejected? Even if you publish a book, guess what? You’re going to be rejected. Dax Shepard said something on his podcast “Armchair Expert,” when he was interviewing Ellen Pompeo (an Everett native) where he was talking about Hollywood success and the whole process of being an actor on a television show. He basically broke down the process of the amount of luck in…alright, so you land a role on a pilot for a television how. Cool, you will be even more lucky if the pilot gets picked up for an order to do more shows. Then, the show has to get picked up for a season, and subsequent seasons. Then, critically….what are the taste makers going to say about this show? There are a number of variables that happen when you create ANYTHING. Anything at all. Realistically? My proofreader hit the nail on the head. If you are driven enough to see a project to completion? That’s a big fucking deal. If it reaches publication? That’s a big fucking deal. I don’t make a big deal of that because I have the Dax Shepard mentality. Story written? Check. Story published? No fucking way, I can’t believe it but, check. Do libraries want it? Are people going to get the copies they pre-ordered? Are people going to share it on social media or share it with their friends or book clubs? I wish I could just tell a room full of writers. The most important thing for all of you to realize is that it’s a HUGE feat to just do the work. If the work gets published? That’s phenomenal, pat yourselves on the back. If it gets read by even the tiniest fraction of people? That’s monumental. Don’t write because you think its going to make you famous. Don’t write because you think it will make you a millionaire. Sure, Snooki from Jersey Shore is a New York Times Best Selling Author and that drives me fucking nuts. Absolutely. Nuts. Well, she’s famous. I don’t know why. But she is famous. But do you really want to be Snooki famous? To be able to get that kind of success or do you want to be a real fucking writer? Write every day but also have realistic expectations for what the world of writing has for you. Because when you sit in a room full of people who think they’ll become the next J.K. Rowling or that they have the idea that will turn into the next cultural juggernaut? You want to be supportive and say…hey, of course you do. Realistically? Everyone thinks that. I don’t think my book is going to appeal to the cultural zeitgeist, I’m just proud to not have the regret that my mom does. She always wanted to write a novel, but she never felt brave enough or confident enough to do it. So I grew up with a chip on my shoulder because I wanted to do it so she could say if she couldn’t her baby boy could. With my kids? I wrote a fucking book. If they love working on cars, want to cook, want to be like their mother and pursue healthcare? I bore the creative albatross; they don’t have do. I’d rather see them go off and do practical and important things. If you want to be creative? Don’t make it your conviction, because that’s what I did….and its not an easy life. That’s why I love that my sister jokes that the book over drafted her account (she failed to grasp that pre-ordering just means you are reserving a spot until they get the books then they’ll charge you, she assumed they’d charge her then and there) then joked that she was going to sell her copies on Ebay for $75. I told her she’d be lucky if they returned her money and offered an apology. I do what I do because it matters to me. When I am not writing a story? A poem? Or just a blog…I feel fucking edgy. I need to fucking write. I’m not making money off of what I write, however I am getting the satisfaction of completing a thought and if I’m lucky? Someone (its very seldom) might tell me they enjoyed what I wrote. That’s writing. Seriously. That’s it. Book comes out tomorrow. I’m going to hang out with a friend who keeps telling me she has something planned for the day of my book coming out but won’t tell me what. That’s the added bonus of this book. Someone wants to make the day special for me and they don’t have to. I am ALL nerves. Is everyone going to get their copies? Are more libraries going to reach out to me? Is anyone going to like this book? Are people going to want to share it on social media? Meanwhile…I will clean toilets two more nights this week and then…. Now, what? If you want to be a REAL writer? That’s the question you will never stop asking yourself. Because, you won’t just write a book, become a millionaire, and sit on a shit ton of wealth patting yourself on the back. If you are lucky to get anything out of the creative lottery? It will be one person telling you that they felt what you wrote and you connected with them. That’s the wealth. Whenever anyone asks me what the book is about...and I try not to tell them the truth. It is the story about a man who has to confront his past before it devours and destroys not just him but his new family. What I want to say is, its the story about a little boy who just wanted to be free from the pain that his father's shadow had over so much of his life. It is fiction...and it is horror. But there is no one monster, there are several. When you all read it, you tell me who you think they are. Then I just want to tell them what tomorrow will feel like for me....and all I can say is this. I hate the month of September. I hated it before he died, then his death made me hate it even more. When I learned that my first and likely only book was coming out the first of the month...it just sealed the deal.
The luck part? I would be so lucky if in a few days, weeks, months, years...if someone I knew, or someone arbitrarily happened to find my book and read it came back to me and said...
Good artists and writers want to be seen or validated. Iconoclasts and masters? Just wanted to feel like someone could relate and hope to god it did something for them. That's not to say I feel in either category. But incentive drives everything. I'd rather feel like the one thing I'm okay at could change someone's view of themselves, than of myself.
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