On most days, my duties are light: sit at a typewriter and bleed, shape the world and stop it from going to sleep, find a spot at the coffee shop near an electrical outlet. I sit there and I write. I look at pretty people come in and leave. I wait for my coffee to reach sipping temperature. I sit there and do nothing. I describe a fictional scene, or transfer a memory into a made-up person’s life.
My friend Cassie sent me a text the other day saying how she believes I have the hardest job of any of her friends. “I look to books to show me the big picture,” I’m paraphrasing here, since my phone’s memory is weak and I was forced to delete the message, “to make sense of the world, to entertain me. That’s a heavy burden.”
Some days, yes. Some days it’s tough to just sit there and try to make art that feels worthwhile. Some days it’s easy, and everything feels golden. Then the next day I edit the golden stuff to try to make it a little more golden. Even some of those days are easy.
Some days, I finish a chapter and immediately start another one. Some days I write a paragraph and decide it is not a day for writing, and I try to go find some other way to spend my day thinking about life. Some days, I write for hours and hours and it is as easy as breathing.
But today? Today, I make salsa.
