Jan

13

Take a picture it’ll last longer

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A while ago my aunt asked me if I was planning to work on a book, now that I’m in this season of parenting/life and have more time on my hands. Oh gosh no, I said, laughing a little. I guess I just don’t feel called to that. I wish I did, really. I wish the words felt pent up, ready to pour from me. Or even that I would lower a bucket and at first it would just be a hollow rattling sound but eventually, arduously, it would fill. Writing feels like such a wetwork excavation, and I feel so dry.

People have often asked me when I plan to write a book. It’s meant as a compliment, I know. Writing a whole entire book and of course getting that book published is such an massive accomplishment and endorsement, I have so much admiration for that path. Maybe that’s still in my future, I don’t know. It’s always just felt too hard for me, really. I can’t imagine the discipline to spend that much time in the liminal space of writing, especially without constant feedback and encouragement along the way. I can’t imagine coming up with that much material, to be honest. I have often felt best suited to exactly this type of writing here on my little blog, relatively short and without much structure. When people say you should write a book! I have often thought, well but I like this. I’ve recently been watching TikTok videos from a girl who talks about true crime stories and her comments are full of people telling her to get a podcast, but she’s so right for the short-form video format.

It is true there is more of a potential for a larger audience with a book. I wonder if that would even be something I’d want, though. Larger audiences are scary. Whoever is still out there reading this blog, bless you, because it’s not like I make it easy. The little email notification thing is long broken, no one really uses RSS readers any more, and I don’t promote on social media. I feel like whatever’s happening here between me the writer and you the reader, it’s pretty intentional and personal at this point. You’re not just stumbling upon me. And even if you are, that’s kind of special just because of how unlikely it is. Here I am, writing letters in bottles and tossing them willy-nilly into the sea, and there you are on some distant beach. That’s pretty cool.

I miss how the Internet used to be, how we used to discover each other as writers. I miss reading bloggers on a regular basis and how that was so motivating for my own writing, and how I just don’t feel that way from monetized Substacks or viral social posts. But who cares — the world has moved on. Crabbing about that feels like when I drive by this sign near our town that says “I MISS THE AMERICA I GREW UP IN.” You probably miss blatant racism, I always think, grouchily, but maybe they mean something more wholesomely nostalgic. Maybe they miss when everyone watched the same TV shows or didn’t have phones to stare at or kids played outside until moms stood on porches and called them in or food wasn’t full of processed garbage or microplastics, but what does it matter? The sign is silly, because here we are, hurtling ever forward. We can’t be mired in what we miss because we’ll never get it back, not really. I’d write a book about it but I’ll never have the right words.