Being The Secret Writer

AND Slush Pile Is Tomorrow

A Guy Walks into a Reading

And wow. Two weeks back at Slush Pile we seemed to run shy of stories. After two hours of writers jockeying to read, the stories ran dry. This left us with either an hour of socializing or an early exit, but then the strangest thing took place. A newcomer in blue-collar clothes hesitantly offered to read his work. To judge from his beard and Dickies he might’ve worked on a ferry boat — his story took place on a ferry boat. What shook me was his reluctance to come forward.

As He Read…

It was like looking at a time machine. At his age I would never have stepped forward. Sure, I’d have a story folded-up in my pocket, but too much would be at stake to read that story to strangers. For the first eight years I wrote, writing was my most precious secret. No one at the Freightliner factory knew. No one at my gym knew I wrote. No one in my family knew. The four people in Tom’s workshop knew, but God forbid anyone beyond that ever found out.

That’s what makes Slush Pile an improvement over bars. The space takes away the pressure to perform, and we’re among very generous people who are hoping you’ll read — not demanding to be entertained.

It’s not shame that kept me a secret writer. It was fear: the fear of failing at the only one biggest goal I’d ever hoped to reach. If I failed at least no one would know. To become a professional writer — to publish a book — was my last big dream, and perhaps that’s why I couldn’t give it up: there was no dream waiting to replace it. If I gave up there would be no more dreams. Sure, I’d have distractions — vacations, projects, work, and I’d have relationships — but I’d have no one big dream. If that dream took me the next fifty years, fine, at least I’d be trudging toward a big, insane, impossible goal of my own choosing.

It’s better to die striving for a goal of your choice than to succeed spectacularly at a goal chosen for you by someone else. So anyway, bravo to the guy in the Dickies with his secret story and reluctance. That was me. Geez, that was me.

I mention this because if you’re that secret writer, I understand. Slush Pile is tomorrow evening from 6:30 until 9:30, at 7804 SE Salmon, Portland, OR. If you come — even if you read something — we won’t tell anyone. We will keep your secret.

Now a Big Ask from You

Please do NOT become a paid subscriber to my Plot Spoiler.

At least not until I ask, if ever. I hate this newsletter having its hand in your pocket, and I don’t want to waste your time with “content” that fulfills the expectation of shoveling something out. From time to time I’ll suggest you read a book, and THAT you should find and read. I’d much rather you had a small shelf of used books, and those books will be more useful to you than me inventing “tips” or “inspiration.”

If I don’t send you a post… that doesn’t mean I don’t love you.

It means you should read Slaughterhouse 5 that week. Don’t worry, I will continue to post oddball shit — exercises, stunts, prompts, ephemera — but don’t pay money for that. Buy Nami Mun’s book instead. Buy Monica Drake’s books. If you have a buck, look for The Pat Hobby Stories by F. Scott Fitzgerald — these are complete crap short stories and “sketches” Fitzgerald was shilling to Esquire magazine in the days before he died. Fitz was begging a hundred bucks for each, and hoping he’d eventually cobble them together into a fix-up novel. Even after his star had so completely fallen, the Fitz was still slugging it out, writing about a washed-up former big-name writer named Pat Hobby, never giving up, still working the shitty gig economy in Hollywood and New York. The Pat Hobby Stories will teach you more about writing — and the life of a writer — than I ever could. Buy and read that.

And Slush Pile is tomorrow.