Even more about writing

N & I had dinner with blueberry pie and ice cream for dessert, and stayed up and talked about politics, religion, families and sex.

I told her about R’s comment about me being a great fiction writer. Her response was that I am not a fiction writer, that it’s completely obvious that I’m a great nonfiction writer. One of the best at B, in fact. But that she misses the “edge” I used to have. I think she likes the drinking and screwing around Miss H more than the philosophizing and pontificating Miss H, at least in print. And I understand that the former is more fun to read. But more on my alleged “edge” in a moment.

It’s completely maddening to listen to other people’s opinions of what kind of writer I am or should be, but nonetheless I think it would be a mistake to dismiss their comments. They are both smart, discerning people, and good writers themselves, who have known me and read my work for quite awhile. They take my talents seriously, which is a compliment that I have to take seriously.

As for their conflicting opinions, it should be noted that N never read the stories that R did, and R never read the essays I was doing at B.

I don’t think that either one begrudges me the desire to find another way of making a living—if they do, they shouldn’t. They both know what it’s like to try to make a living writing and doing all the side jobs that writers typically do—teaching and selling books and writing newspaper journalism or press releases and having frustrating conversations with agents and publishers.

I think they’re disappointed, as I am, that I haven’t yet found the right outlet for my abilities. I haven’t quite found my material. We all agree that it would be shame if I stopped trying. But I’m not giving up.

In fact, I’ve done my best work when I was busiest and had the least amount of time for it, which gives me hope. Although law school will have to come first, I’m going to attempt to do one fairly polished essay or story a month, no matter if I feel inspired or not. Just like when I was at B. If I have a little time, I can send them out to magazines, and at least I can put them here where a few people might read them. I’m actually pretty interested in what I could do with this blog, or another one. I’d like to develop it beyond what it is now. I’m still experimenting.

I can’t pretend that law school isn’t going to be an obstacle to writing. And I worry that maybe it will make me a worse writer. But what if I called it off?

It’s scary to know that half the writers in the gulf south have applied for my job. It makes me uneasy to give up something that’s in such high demand. Yet, at this point, staying with it would seem like a let down.

Nor do I have some kind of big writing project in mind. Well, I have one, maybe, but the subject is such that I would feel like a sucker for devoting that much time thinking about it.

Anyway, N and I are both inspired by the example of a writer she’s been reading, Mary Wesley, who wrote the first of a series of novels when she was in her 70s.

It’s not too late, it’s never too late, until you’re dead.

N’s comments about my edginess reminded me of the film Ghost World, which I recently saw for the third time. I love it, though it’s so painful to watch. I used to be so much like Enid, so reflexively mean and contemptuous and above it all, but in a way that was almost necessary for self-protection. That was the edge that was in almost everything I wrote when I lived in Memphis. I’m sure it was fun to read, and it was probably fun for some of the people around me, at least those who weren’t the targets of my scorn. But it was miserable for me, just as Enid is quite obviously miserable. It’s funny, for part of that time I was married, and my husband was quite a lot like Seymour, only heavier and with somewhat different musical obsessions. Now, in a case of karmic revenge, I feel like I’m turning into Seymour.