Eric Arvin's Blog, page 21

EXCERPT: Books By Covers

One of my personal favorite short stories I've ever written. From my anthology Slight Details & Random Events:

Books by Covers Eric Arvin

Jimmy stretched his leg muscles on the steps in front of his apartment, releasing the tension for the torture. A good run on this spring afternoon would be just what he needed. It was a beautiful day, offering lovely promises. He could run for a while and clear the obstacles, the hurdles, in his mind. He often wondered when it was the real world started taking control of his psyche, regulating his inner thoughts until they mirrored one another. Had it happened innocently? Little by little? Or was it, as he had always suspected, clump by clump?
Runners don't like clumps. They're unexpected. Clumps can make a runner trip and fall.
Forget the world, he told himself. Forget the world you see. Forget the world as it's reflected in your mind. Clarity. That's what you need.
Jimmy set off tracking that clarity. He didn't think he'd truly find it. The answers to his questions and concerns seemed too big. He'd been troubled for weeks after all. Still, a jog could help him think, to ponder. Jimmy needed that alone time. The small college town went on around him - mothers and children on sidewalks, the postman delivering his packages, cars driving leisurely past, college students off campus interacting with the townsfolk. So serene and just so. Like a film set or TV show from the fifties.
Jimmy headed in the direction of the liberal arts school. He had chosen to go to a larger university. Got his BA at a prestigious school up north, but dropped out of grad school before he could get his Masters. He regretted that. But at the time he just couldn't do it anymore. He had had enough of education. He had been sidetracked by other things. Like the full-time gig at the fashionable clothing store to help pay off his increasing credit card debt. Or the insurance for the sports car he no longer thought of as his baby. Now, though, he desperately needed to get back to school. He envied teachers and college professors who were surrounded by academia at all times. He was in need of a real job, a career. Especially with the wedding coming up. Gunner had his heart set on a house, an expensive house. A house so expensive both of them would have to sell their souls to obtain it. But for Gunner, Jimmy would do it. Jimmy did a lot of things for Gunner.
Sidetracked. Short cuts.

Professor Robbins taught Classic Literature at the college. She was normally a content person. She had a nice, quiet life with a loving partner who she had met at Pride years ago, she had a smart, young daughter, she had a nice home on the college campus, and she adored her students. She loved the looks on their faces when they learned something new. That spark of epiphany that doesn't happen but every so often; just enough to make it precious and longed for. Yes, she was usually happy with her life's course. She had designed it.
But as she stared out the window over the heads of the small classroom of students taking an exam, she saw a handsome young man jog by. It wasn't the man that stalled her really. Her tastes didn't run his way. It was his seeming physical perfection, his lack of flaws, that captivated her. He looked like a sculpture, the kind she had struggled to create in her undergraduate career. She had so wanted to be a great artist. She studied the classics – Rodin, Michelangelo, Bernini – but she could never quite get it right. All her life it had been her dream to bring life from stone, her hands working an almost divine thing. Like a goddess.
But life in its pushy way convinced her to try other things. It prodded her in a more logical direction. Something which might bring more money and stability. Successful artists are rare, she heard over and over. Art is ever changing because tastes and fads change daily, hourly. An artist would be unemployable, she was told. Especially a sculptor. Who sculpts nowadays? There are machines for that.
He does, Professor Robbins said to herself defensively. This young man jogging. He sculpts his body every day in the gym. Like art, it takes skill, study, persistence, and time. He must be so joyous. The world gets to see his sculpture everywhere he goes. A great artist runs among us today. Don't you see?
But no one would ever see. No one saw the world and its unfairness as well as she.
She closed her eyes. Dreams leave me alone. I'm happy. I'm quite content.

The college lawn was always Jimmy's favorite part of the campus. Everyone was carefree as they studied or lounged on the grass. Their minds caught up in frivolous pursuits. Not a notion that things might get worse in the future. He remembered the future in college sounded to him like an obscure idea; something other people thought about. Something that was whispered with hushed dread, but never truly confronted.
Plan for the future? An impossibility. How can one plan for what they don't know or have never experienced?
Jimmy felt envious of the students on the lawn, of the boys tossing frisbees over the heads of lovers. He wanted to sit among them again, to feel that blissful unawareness. But he also worried for them. How many would survive after college? How many could surmount the world's bulky hurdles?
Dotting the lawn like wildflowers, the coupled lovers kissing made him think of his relationship with Gunner. Would they stay as passionate? He wanted a life-long romance. (Oh, how Hollywood has ruined that word!) Would it happen? Would Gunner stay with him till the end? Would Jimmy want him to?

Elise watched the man jogging. She wasn't the only one, but she was most likely the only one not lusting, not hooting and making vulgar noises. A gaggle of girls on the south side of the lawn were doing enough of that. Elise was instead struck by the runner's resemblance to her high school sweetheart. A twinge of bittersweet remorse enfolded her heart. The chemistry book on her lap suddenly felt heavier, less about her future and more about things left behind.
She was a senior now. She hadn't seen Bud for over three years. She left him the summer before her freshman year saying she had to go. She had to get out of the small town she had grown up in. There was nothing for her there. Those were painful words to say. She realized they were probably even more painful to hear.
"There's me. I'm here," Bud had pleaded.
That wasn't enough. She didn't understand why he didn't understand. She had loved him. And now this runner was breaking her heart and he didn't even know it.
Elise couldn't imagine ever feeling the way she felt about Bud toward anyone else. The world was filled with little boys and tiny men. Bud was different, mature. He was as wonderful as any woman could have hoped. He wanted to marry her. She had wanted the same once.
What happened?
She knew she shouldn't regret her choices. College was always down the road for her in high school. But still, the runner was making it hard to forget lost chances. She tried to look away. She tried to focus on the body, not the face. Bud and the runner didn't have the same body. Bud was strong from years of farm work, not weights.
Elise imagined the runner had never made a bad choice in his life. Mr. Perfect with his perfect body, his perfectly planned life.
That's what she chose to believe.

The wedding was only two months away. Still too soon for Jimmy. Not that he didn't want to pledge himself to Gunner. No, he wanted it more than anything, but there was just so much to do. There was a life neither of them could see that needed to be planned out.
"We'll get by," Gunner always said.
Money doesn't fall from trees. You have to climb up to get it.
All their arguments lately had turned into fights. Fights about money. It could get bad. Fists could fly over money, over what needed to be done with it or how much should be spent when. Whenever Jimmy brought Gunner a gift, Gunner reminded him the money spent could have been used toward the house.
Gunner's big, beautiful house that he had to have.
Jimmy tried to shirk the thought of that house off, to leave it behind on the college lawn as he ran. But it kept up the pace. Worries seem to be able to do that. They're more up to a challenge than clarity. Clarity is free and unbothered. It drifts; it doesn't run.
The way Jimmy saw it, they couldn't both afford to go back to school. Gunner had already started with his new degree. But to afford that house, they both would have to get much better jobs. And Jimmy couldn't get a better job without going back to school.
Circles and circles, running in circles.
Jimmy really didn't want the house. It was very nice. He agreed with Gunner about that. But a nice apartment would have been better. In the long run, a new, larger apartment would be better both financially and for their relationship. Funny how money can take dreams and love apart like disection.
Love is all finances now.
Jimmy ran past the new construction site on campus. A state of the art science building was going up, replacing the old one. He didn't understand why. The old one was nice. The construction workers were on a break. They whistled and catcalled at Jimmy.
"Nice tits!" one yelled. The others cackled in macho solidarity. There was contempt beneath those laughs.

Bull. That's what they called him because that's what he looked like. A big angry bull.
"Nice tits," his fellow construction workers repeated what he said in a congratulatory manner. As if it were the most brilliant thing ever muttered and they wanted to remember it. They'd repeat the story at the bar that night.
Bull smiled, accepted their compliments, but he didn't feel like a clever man. He felt full of doubts upon seeing the young man jog past. He wasn't always a bull. He was healthy and young once too. He had a body others admired at one time just like the runner. Girls loved him. But now, after years of neglect and bad habits that body had disappeared beneath layers of another. Where had he gone? Not this flabby man sitting on scaffolding in the sun, but the man he was, the man he truly was, who had a sense of pride in how he looked. Where had that man gone?
This happened, he thought, as he took a huge bite of his double bacon cheeseburger. Life. Family. Responsibility. Everything that young runner was yet to find, if he ever would. He looked the type to never have problems.
Bull had looked like that once. Had people thought the same of him? That he never had problems? In Bull's life, things were not handed to him. Things were earned or taken. Lots of things were taken. His little girl after his wife left him; all the money his ex-wife took from him each month; dignity; looks; health.
The doctor told him he's have a heart attack if he didn't start eating right. He was too overweight, his cholesterol too high.
Bull looked at his burger. He remembered a time when he was concerned with his health. He should try to be concerned again. But it was hard now. He would never get his body back anyway; he would never find his former self hiding within.
Why try?

Nice tits. Funny. Jimmy smiled, trekking onward toward the baseball diamond. He had to admit his pectorals, though all muscle, did bounce when he ran. Tits are tits to straight men. He could have been offended, but why bother. Those construction workers probably had so little fun in their lives, so little real purpose, that he would allow them their fun at his expense. At least the remark had momentarily distracted him from his problems.
He respected construction workers. Theirs was a hard job. A job with an estimable outcome. Something that might benefit society. Jimmy couldn't say the same about his own job, his non-career. Managing a clothing store. What was so special about that? Day after day of hearing Little Susie Gotta-have-its gush over designer clothes. All his years of education, of being told by countless teachers that he could change the world, and what? Teachers lie. It's their job.
The world changes without you just fine. You're a colonist. A useless colonist. You're a faceless runner in the Boston marathon.
The college baseball team was at practice. Hot young guys in shorts that molded their asses deliciously. But Jimmy wasn't in the mood to gawk. Even if he was, he wasn't too attracted to the younger set anymore. Besides, ballplayers had only space enough in their brains for a few things. Baseball, women, and doping.
Stereotypes play out before us. We accept them because we choose to.
Jimmy wished his mind was that vacant. He wished he could forget everything. Everything but men. Then he'd be a stereotype too. Just what the world wanted. He wished he could forget Gunner for a moment. He wished Gunner's house away. Fallen down. Burnt down. Torpedoed.
Play ball, boys. Enjoy it.

Trevor watched the muscle man jog past. He was readying to practice his swing but the pitcher wasn't ready. Trevor had seen the runner before. He must be from town, he thought. A townie. Townies like being around the college boys.
Trevor didn't understand why he couldn't look away. But when the muscle man came into view he had to watch. He was mesmerized by the mass of the man. He felt an uncomfortable tightness in his shorts. Thank god for his jock strap or the guys would think he was getting a boner staring at the muscle man. They couldn't see it, but he felt it. Usually that excitement was a good thing, but he felt bothered by it in this instance.
I'm not gay. I'm not gay. But I bet he is.
Earlier in the day Trevor had taunted a classmate at lunch. One of the gay kids, out and open about it at the small college.
He was asking for it. It's just teasing. He'll survive.
Trevor was certain the kid was looking at him, leering. The kid wanted him. All the gay boys had a thing for him. He was sure about that. So this muscle jogger must have a thing for him too.
Were there such a thing as gay vibes? Homo-radio waves? Maybe the runner was sending his waves to Trevor.
Why did he feel so bad after he mocked the gay kid? After he called him names in front of everyone. The kid deserved it, right? Like this runner. Flaunting himself in front of the college boys. Trying to get noticed.
Which way's the gym? Follow me to the locker room.
Trevor couldn't stop watching the runner's chest. How it bounced and moved. Beautiful. Could another man be beautiful?
Did I just think that? Why am I hard?
Trevor didn't hear the pitcher say he was ready, though he rose the bat at the sound of his voice. His attention was still on the runner's chest and his own crotch. But he definitely felt the pain as the ball nailed in the testicles.
Oh, God! I'm gay.

Jimmy stopped near the woods that bordered the campus. He needed a rest from all the voices in his head. All the 'what-to-dos'. He took a deep breath and let in decision. It flowed through him like clarity. He knew what he had to do because there was simply no way around it. Appearances be damned.
They would make it past this bump in the road. He and Gunner would have a great life together and their wedding would be gorgeous. As big as Gunner wanted. They'd splurge. They'd use the money they were going to use for the house.
The house they would not be getting.
Gunner could hate him for a few days. That was preferable to Gunner hating him for the rest of their lives simply because finances had driven a wedge between them. Jimmy would explain this. Somehow, Gunner would understand. Surely, he would. Gunner was short-sighted but he wasn't ignorant.
"And," Jimmy thought, "it's my life too. I'll make him happy without a house."
They could even go to school together. Both of them. Classmates.
But first he would have to think about when to break the news he had received that morning.
The doctor said, "Jimmy, you have a lump on your testicle."
God, when to tell Gunner! He'll fold. I know Gunner. Know him like a book.

REPOST: Death in the Hospital

Posted this on my other blog last July concerning something that happened to me while I was in the hospital with a deadly case of pneumonia in September 2010 (I can't seem to keep away from those places!). I post this now because of a convo I had yesterday with my friend Stacey:


I thought I'd share another of the strange occurrences/hallucinations/visions I had last September when I was in the hospital for a month with a deadly strain of pneumonia. Again, it felt as real as real. As real as me standing here and typing this post.

I saw, in this state, that I was no longer in my hospital room. I was in a bed, but the bed was in the attic of a Victorian home. I didn't actually see the outside of the house, but somehow I just knew it was Victorian. The furniture was all of that period, as was the clothing of my nurse, Lilly. She wore her long dark hair (which in reality was cut short) swept up into a knot on the top of her head. She wore a long dark, chekered gown which had a lace neck that went all the way up to just under her chin. I remember her checking on something beside my bed, though there were no electronic items in sight. I guess my mind blocked them out to favor the vision. All the noise around me was water-logged.

My mother sat on the other side of my bed toward my feet, dressed in Victorian wear (she loves the period) and reading from a book. I'll say right now that I have never been a fan of anything Victorian. The style of fashion and architecture has never appealed to me, so I'm still a bit confused as to why this vision came to me in such a manner.

So, there I was. In a Victorian era house instead of a hospital room. And it hit me. I was dead. That's the thought that came over me suddenly. I am dead and they aren't telling my mother I am dead. It was the strangest feeling. I was shocked yet relieved. And I felt like I was waiting on something to happen so I could move on to...somewhere. But first I needed someone to tell my mother I was dead and I was so upset they weren't doing so. And I was so certain. I was so certain I was dead.

REPOST: The Evolution of Friendship

Wrote this back in 09 on Daventry Blue. 




Even old friends fade away when you get seriously ill. I discovered this a while back. That moment that you tell them that you are sick and there's a chance that you might not recover, an invisible wall begins to go up. From that day forward, you will be seen as "different from them" even after you recover. Tip-toes and egg shells. That's the feeling.

I had some very good friends in college. The best I'd ever made. But even those friendships could not shout through the invisible wall of illness. By the time I was better (never well, but better), the distance was too great to repair most of the strained relationships. There was so much space between us. Too much had happened in our lives. We were different people who had experienced different realities.

Death and illness are the most unwelcome of things in a young person's reality.

Every so often I will be contacted from someone I knew in high school or college via Facebook or one of the various forms of slightly annoying, cloyingly urgent messaging services. (You must answer it! You must!) The usual banter ensues: what are you up to, how's life, etc. I try to put off saying "I had brain surgery" for as long as possible, but eventually it has to come out. You've no idea what an amazing bug-be-gone that is. Usually, I never hear from said friend again. It's happened quite a few times.

Honestly, though, I can understand the need to back away from illness. I sense the awkwardness even over the internet. People's experiences with illness echo down through the years. To see a sick friend, someone who had once been so vibrant, can't help but resound in someone's head "This was your father or grandmother. This could be you."

When I had my surgery, many of my friends came to offer support. This was kind and unexpected. I hadn't seen some of them for a couple of years. After the surgery, though, we've pretty much vanished from each other's lives completely. Diverging paths. Again, it was expected.

My biggest issue in dealing with my illness had nothing to do with my past friendships, but with people I knew (family and therapists) who kept continuously telling me how I SHOULD look at things. I hold to the belief that no one has the right to tell you how you SHOULD feel about something, in fact, they have never experienced anything on the realm of you're going through. It just doesn't seem possible to me for most people to have the empathy to understand. If you want to give a trauma victim hope, find someone who knows where the victim is coming from. I don't want a drop-dead gorgeous doctor telling me I should be happy to be alive. Fuck off, Mr. Perfect!

I had a doctor at the physical therapy hospital I was recuperating at in New Albany, Indiana tell me that I was a lost cause. He said this having woken me up at two in the morning, examining my legs for movement as if he were checking on livestock. I don't know if he thought I was asleep or not, but I wanted to knock the shit out of him for his flippant remark. I also had a physical therapist at the very same hell hole tell me to not expect too much in terms of recovery. Needless to say, this dampened my spirit. But only for a bit.

You see, I'm a stubborn bitch. I knew I had a strong will. I also knew that every body was different. No two people react the same to any given treatment. After having laid in that damn place for three weeks, sometimes only allowed out of bed (and I counted) 15 minutes day (far less than I knew I should or could be doing), I checked my floppy self out of the hospital against their wishes. I was walking in a week. I was back to the gym within a month.

When I was in that soul-sucking den, I didn't get a single visit from a friend. At the time, it didn't occur to me because I was so intent on getting better. But now, I understand that as a turning point. Maybe my friends sensed it as well. One life was ending, another beginning. I understood that certain friendships had to be put to rest because the person who I had become could find no further growth in many of those relationships. I could see clearly the artificiality of certain connections I had once thought so important.

So, here I am. It's been lonely at times, the recovery, this new Being, and I hope in the end it will be worth the sacrifices. I feel like I'm starting to surface again, but it's not going to happen overnight. I have different friends now, but I still miss the old ones sometimes, and the old me. It's like standing at a door that's about to shut for good and waving to everyone on the other side. No words of goodbye (because what words can describe that ache in the throat), only smiles and nods and thoughts of what had been but can't ever be again.

The List

1. I've settled on my next writing project: a spec fic epic titled Terms We Have For Dreaming. I've been waiting to write this for a while. I needed to be in the right place. More info later.

2. My short story She's Come Undone is now available through Untreed Reads. You can get it on Amazon, etc.

3. I booked me a fancy nancy hotel room for the GRL convention in New Mexico this October. Fancy. Nancy.

4. Madonna's newest collection MDNA is a lot of fun. I've been listening to it non-stop the last few days. In fact, I'm listening to it right now. It's not Ray of Light, but it's much better than Hard Candy.

5. Grimm is struggling for me. I think it comes down to the main character's partner and also his wife. I'm just not into them.

6. Ima be a judge for fellow writer Tj Klune's upcoming Bad Poetry Extravaganza. More info HERE. Win some stuff!

7. While I loved the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica, I have to say the prequels have very little interest for me. I would be much more interested in a series that takes place the same time as BSG, but focuses on a renegade band of survivors left behind on Caprica after the Cylons chase the fleet across the stars. Now THERE'S a series.

REPOST: Grabbing Myself Inappropriately

Reposting another of my "Greatest Hits" from Daventry Blue:




I like playing with my tits.

Seriously. They deserve the love. My chest - my pectorals, if you want to get all manly about it, being that some guys get squirmy saying anything remotely feminine about their bodies - has always been there for me. Even when I have been very ill and have taken weeks, even months off my workout routine to recover, my chest, or some shadow of it, has remained. And when I returned to my workouts my chest has always been the first body area to respond. It has perked right up. Good morning! For this reason, it's always been my favorite area to hit in the gym, and maybe, in some deep psychological way, this is the reason why I'm so drawn to illustrations of heavily boobified men.

Not that I'm the only one. Straight guys are just as interested in another guy's huge chest as us gays. I remember once in college, when I was at the peak of my bodybuilding, I was running on a treadmill. The treadmills in the college gym were lined up against a three foot high dividing wall between the weight room and the basketball courts. Sometimes in the spring, when it rained, the baseball team would have their practice inside. One day, as I was running, wearing a so-tight-it's-silly tank top, I caught the eye of one of the players at batting practice. He was directly opposite me ad so I was unavoidable to his sight. Well, he was nearly killed by the first pitch. I had distracted him. I couldn't help but smile as he tried to recompose himself under a wealth of embarrassment. Ah, good times...

This is not to say that I don't appreciate the rest of the male form and don't try just as hard to achieve some sort of symmetry between the rest of my body and my chest. But, as any fitness fiend will tell you, every body's makeup is different and some parts just don't respond to training as well as others. It's rare to find anyone who has perfect symmetry without some cosmetic help. If you do find them, give them a dirty look from me.

My thighs respond well to my workouts, though with my weak ankle I can't hit them as hard as I'd like. Everyone wants a nice ass. For me, "nice ass" means bubbly and round. I was recently watching the Disney film Tangled. Cute movie. I really liked the animation style. While watching I found myself quite enamored at first by the hero, Flynn Rider. Yet when he descended the walls of Rapunzel's tower I noticed, "Somebody done erased that boy's ass!"What is it with Disney? None of the heroes have much booty at all. But the villains? Well, the two twins chasing Flynn were...Yowzer! And lets not any of us forget about Gaston fromBeauty & the Beast! ("He's such a doggone strong and handsome brute!") I guess, though, until Patrick Fillion starts making animated films we'll never see truly objectified men in that art form.

That's a shame too, because... wait...what was I saying? I was just distracted when I gave myself a reach-around. Ah, yes. T&A. It's not just for straight men anymore.

'Who We Are' Bad Poetry Contest

The super adorable Tj Klune has a new book coming out soon and is having a bad poetry contest as promotion. I am honored to be asked to be one of the judges. Yay! I'm a celebrity! Ima gonna take all of Lindsay Lohan's press. Anyway, here's more info on the contest:

Last Day to Vote

Today's the last day of voting for the Gaybies. My book  Woke Up in a Strange Place  is nominated in the Best Fantasy/Speculative Fiction category against some amazing works. Get your vote on HERE. Also nominated - and competing against himself - is my pal Patrick Fillion. He holds three of the six nods in the Best Comic Book category.

5 Songs Before My Sugar Coma

"Into the Great Wide Open" by Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers - Awesome video to this song, starring Johnny Depp. Tom Petty always reminded me of my oldest brother.
"Up Against the Wall" by Peter Bjorn & John - Can't help but think of the jeans commercial this song was used in. They did straight and gay versions of the ad.
"Both Sides Now" by Joni Mitchell - A classic. Up there with my personal favorite Mitchell songs like "River" and "Amelia."
"Voices" by Madonna - From my least favorite of Madonna's albums, Hard Candy.
"To Deserve You" by Bette Midler - Wow. This list suddenly turned very gay. This is a good dance track, and I'm not usually a dance track fan (Madonna notwithstanding).

The Long Lost Bible Passage Wherein God Brings the Sexy Back to Sunday

"And God said unto the people: 'For six days thou shall be strict in thy dietary intake, yet on the seventh thy shall eat of the brownies, and of the pizzas, and the fried foods, and the little salty things that look like fish but are not, and the muffins, and the cookies; Yay, thou shall eat of all of these and not gain an ounce. For on the seventh day neither calories not fat shall exist. In fact, for that one day weekly, they shall go poofith as if they never existed at all.' And God looked upon his creation and saw that it was sexy."

Amen.

REPOST with Edits: This Writer's Life

This post, which I originally ran on Daventry Blue last year, was the basis for the character "Logan Brandish" in my book Galley Proof:
Things I have learned (and wish to impart) from being a slave to the art of writing:

-You will occasionally read a writer who is so good, whose words and style speak to you with such force and eloquence, that you will wonder if anything as great and marvelous will ever come from you. This will either a) make you try harder, or b) make you throw your hands in the air in resignation and never write again. The first is preferable as you don't want to be perceived as the raging drama queen you secretly are.

-At least five times a year, you will vow to never write again. You will go through such moments of melancholy self-pity as to make a violin sound chipper in comparison. This will last about an hour before a new idea forces you back to the laptop. You will drool on the keyboard from the excitement this new idea causes, because you JUST KNOW this is going to be the story that sails you into the literary stratosphere. You might even get a Lammy nomination! But if you do, don't go to the ceremony. That'll show 'em for not nominating you all those previous times. Yeah. That'll show 'em!

-Every now and then, you will get a wonderful letter or email from a reader telling you how much they enjoy your writing. You will print this out, hold it to your chest for a moment, and put it in a box to look at on rainy days... Do NOT masturbate to it. That's just wrong.

-Or read that letter or email for comfort when a publisher rejects something on which you've worked your ass off. Trust me. It WILL happen. But remember, somewhere in the world there is someone who wants to read exactly what you've written. Always. You just have to find a way to connect with them. Submit to another publisher. You must. It is what you do. Beg, holler, and whore. There are a million publishers out there. Someone wants you.

-You will nearly be destroyed when a project that held such promise falls apart and is relegated to the "Never to be published" pile in your cedar chest (more about that later). You will most likely pick its bones for years to come for other tales. In this way, it still lives. It is Frankenscript, and it will haunt your dreams.

-Writing is lonely. Writing has no social life. It makes up its own and its imaginary friends are very, very pretty. But not as pretty as you.

-You experience a high after finishing a well-executed project that is better than any drug. It's akin to the high after a great workout, if that workout ended with an orgasm and a chocolate muffin.

-Not everything you write will find a home. When you die there will be unpublished stories and outlines found as your relatives are rummaging through your things. They will be in slightly messed stacks because you slightly messed them on purpose to give them a Romantic air. Leave these to your favorite relative. With any luck, they will then be published. If J.R.R. Tolkien's family can exploit his work after he died, so can yours.

-Inspiration comes whenever it wants. This can be at three in the morning in a dream. It will wake you. You will fight the urge to get up and write the idea down, but you will lose. Sometimes inspiration doesn't come for weeks, so you must take it when you can. Accept that you are the vessel and this is your purpose. If you refuse, the gods will be angry and chop off your weiner. You wouldn't want that to happen. If you don't have a wiener, they will give you one and then chop it off.

-The day after the release of a new project is a little depressing. You've spent months, sometimes years, with a group of characters who seem very real to you. In some ways, they're better friends than your friends. (Embrace the crazy.)You've spent weeks promoting the book as best you can with your meager, MEAGER budget. And then, the day comes and goes. Nothing. Suddenly, all you hear are crickets. It's as if what you've written, this great comet of such imagination and fire, hardly made a dent in the atmosphere. Have a muffin. You'll feel better. Soon reviews will start trickling in and all will be well.

-Allow yourself an hour to sulk after a bad review, then get on with your life. It's only one opinion, and screw those festering bung holes for not seeing how brilliant you are. Don't be like director David Lean. It was said that the reason there was 14 years between his films Ryan's Daughter and A Passage To India was because of a review a single critic gave to the first film. That's too much power for someone else's words to have over your own fabulosity.

-You are your own personal shrink. While writing you will have epiphanies and realizations that would freaking blow the world's collective mind. You will solve personal conflicts on your own, and you will most likely THINK.WAY.TOO.MUCH. about everything. So learn to meditate. Tell those muses, "Hey, Muuses! Shut the hell up! I'm trying to watch Ancient Aliens here. Jeez!"

-When someone says to you "you're so lucky to be a writer" avoid the urge to slap them with a raw turkey breast. They mean well, but they don't understand the hard work that goes into it. Nor do they live on the salary you have to survive on, which brings me to...

-You WILL be poor.

-The success of others - including your close friends - will make you occasionally jealous. This does not make you a bad person. Maybe mediocre, but not bad. This feeling does not mean that you wish your friend didn't have such great success. But that you wish YOU did as well. You could be successful together and strut around town flaunting your super coolness to everyone you see. Envy is an ugly color on you. But it looks just fine on others. Strange that.

-Promotion is the Devil. Some writers are naturals in the art of promo. Some are not. You will try, but you just won't get it. The guest blogging, the Facebook ads, the book signings...they all look and sound great, but you have never been Mr. Popular and socializing is a bit of a struggle. There is the constant knowledge that, while you are definitely dateable, you may not be particularly relate-able.

-A good editor will save your butt from looking very stupid. When you get the first edits back for a new manuscript there may be so much red you may question whether you even attended school at all. And while the public will thankfully never see your atrocious guffaws, you can't help but wonder if there is an Editor's Club somewhere in the world - possibly a seedy basement or a seedier library - whereat your name is a punchline.

-Finally, be grateful. You're a writer. And your friend was right. That's pretty damn cool.