More about writing, money, sex and friendship

R’s problem houseguest is in jail for check forgery, according to MP.

A couple of people seem to be dismayed that I said I’m not a fiction writer, or they’ve asked what happened to my novel. Um, which one? Okay, after about three false starts in the last few years, there was one that had some momentum for awhile and is stalled somewhere around the halfway mark. It might have some good parts, but that’s the best I can say about it. Writing fiction, or at least long-form fiction, is for me like trying to get very thick mud through a very thin funnel—lots of hard, messy pushing and very little coming out at the other end. Sometimes I’m get the itch to write a short story, and it comes out fairly easily and might be publishable quality. That happens maybe once every couple of years.

The writing that I think I’m best at is also the kind that is easiest and most fun for me—some kind of personal nonfiction. And I guess I’m arrogant enough to think that my own real life is as interesting as that of whatever character I might invent.

Anyway, look, I’m not quitting writing. I’m going to keep doing it and keep trying to get published, and I feel pretty confident that I’ll have a book or two with my name on it before it’s all over.

What I’m giving up on is trying to make writing my main source of income. The most successful writers I know personally, who’ve published books and articles in national papers and magazines, are all still struggling with money. I think one of the hardest, scariest things to be in our society is an old lady, and it’s even scarier if you’re poor. I’m not going to inherit much of anything from my folks. It seems unlikely I’m going to marry again, let alone marry someone with money. It’s even less likely that I’ll have kids, let alone good smart kids who will make money and take care of me. So I have to take care of myself.

Law school is a gamble. It might turn out to be a mistake, but I think it will give me a way to do something interesting and worthwhile while making a good living. Like the gospel-singing lady on the bus says, that ain’t no bad thing. Okay, if I get out of school and go to work someplace where Exxon is my client, then you can accuse me of selling out. In fact, I hope you will stage an intervention.

But don’t worry too much about me writing. At this point it’s a compulsive habit. The best one I have.

Speaking of compulsion, I have to decide whether or not to go to the waiter’s birthday party. Fifteen years ago, if a cute appealing guy invited me to a party, I would have gone without question. But you get older and beat up by love a few times, and what seemed simple seems impossibly complex and fraught with danger.

JT gave me some crude but good advice, to get my "dick on the side." Not that I should be fucking guys I don’t like or care about, just that sex and guys and relationship shouldn’t be at the center of my life.

The problem is that when I get involved with someone with whom I have some chemistry, it’s like it stages a takeover of about 80% of my brain. I’m a lot saner and more peaceful without all that stuff. But I do miss the good parts, the flirting and fucking and going to the Camellia Grill in the middle of the night. I just don’t know if I trust myself to indulge without giving in to the brain takeover. I've only been able to avoid it when I go out with guys I don’t particularly like or respect, and what fun is that? It’s definitely not a recipe for good sex.

But this is silly. It would be silly and neurotic not to go. It’s just a party, I can leave whenever I want, it’s not a promise to sleep with anyone.

In other news, it seems I’m being stalked by a girl. No, it’s not romantically or sexually motivated, at least I don’t think so. I met this girl, who has been dubbed the Sandspur, though an acquaintance a few months ago. She just moved to New Orleans in January. She’s perfectly nice, or at least it seemed so. Okay, so in six months she’s already dated a few guys I dated first, which seems a little creepy—but it is a small town, and the first one she met before she met me, so I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt. It’s just that, to me, we just don’t seem to click, don’t have much to talk about or much in common except our dating histories. I don’t think that matters to her. She seems compulsively extroverted and needs company constantly. I’m definitely an introvert who would prefer to be alone a lot of the time. Sometimes I isolate myself too much and I’m grateful when my established friends pursue me a bit. But this is different.

One day she called me and I realized I just didn’t want to talk to her and I didn’t answer. Then the next time she called I really didn’t want to talk to her, and now after six unanswered phone messages and a couple of emails, I feel like I’m being stalked and I’ll do anything to avoid her. I hate feeling rude. I feel a little guilty, too, but not that guilty. It seems like a normal person would have caught on by now that I’m just not that interested. Because she doesn’t get the hint, she seems creepy, and it looks like I am going to be in the uncomfortable position of actually having to tell her to stop calling me.