How I Accidentally Published Myself

Seriously. I’m published. Razed.

It was an understated event. I didn’t throw a party. Oprah’s producers weren’t blowing the ringers off my non-existent agent’s phone for an appearance. And I have not had to reject masses of autograph seekers in crowded auditoriums. I’ve only told a few people, and four of them have purchased 10 copies, which means $33.40 in my pocket. So how did I accidentally publish myself?

The tale begins in November 2007 when I took up the challenge to write 50,000 words in 30 days for National Novel Writing Month. I made it to 50,000 but the story wasn’t finished, so I took it to about 56,000. It took 26 days. After I saved the document for the final time, I closed it and, though I thought about it every once in a while, it remained closed.

Then in October 2008, I, along with all the other “winners” — those who reached the word-count goal — received an e-mail telling us that a company called Create Space had agreed to print, for free, proof copies of our submissions, or books. While I didn’t necessarily think obtaining a proof copy would cost a crazy amount of money, I’m a fan of free. I had six months. I’m also a fan of deadlines. Six months would be plenty of time to rework it. Add some chapters to fill in some holes. Develop the characters a little more to give them some more depth. Make the setting more of a character than it was, which would put it more in line with what I originally intended.

Five months later, I finally got going on the first draft, which I wrote in 26 days and hadn’t read since I closed it more than a year earlier. Then I got a job. For a minute, I even gave up on the idea. It’s just a proof copy, I said to myself. Technically, I could take it to Kinko’s (or whatever the Sydney version is) and get it into some type of book form. That was just for a minute, though. Unfortunately, my lack of motivation, or fear, or insecurity, or laziness, or whatever it was that prevented me from taking a real stab at it, meant I only had time for a read-through.

Finally, with one day left before my six-month window closed, I went to the Web site to begin the quick and easy process of ordering my proof copy. Yeah, right.

Ninety minutes, three versions, and two days later, I finally succeeded. I had to design three different covers, search far and wide for a suitable-to-me cover picture (turned out to be one I took), and settle for a really poorly written description. But my submission was finally accepted. And as a part of all of this, I had the option of selling it on Amazon.com.

After going through all that, there was no way I wasn’t going to put it online for sale. It’s $15. I get $3.44 for each copy sold (or something like that). And I’m published. Sort of.

I finally got my free proof copy in the mail. I saw my name on the binding. On the front. I flipped through Razed, stopping at a few randomly selected sentences — three, to be exact — cringing at all of them. And why wouldn’t I: 26 days; no editing.

But then in some strange display of maturity, perhaps influenced by the fact I couldn’t do anything about it, I didn’t seem to care. I cringed, yes, but I wrote the poorly constructed sentences, which contained metaphors as lofty as hot-air balloons on a summer’s day. Really. And I accepted them. It is, after all, my book. If I can’t accept my own writing, then I can’t expect other people to.

I got a taste of being published — my name on a book and all that. It’s actually pretty sweet. And I want it to happen again. But next time, I want someone else to do it for me. And I want Oprah’s people to call.

To Write Or Not to Write This November

I came to a difficult decision the other day, and I didn’t tell anyone about it at first.

Every November, National Novel Writing Month occurs all over the world. Writers every who choose to do so sit down every day or every other day or whenever and write a novel. They, we, have 30 days to write a 50,000-word novel. I found out about it last year, and I participated. And I won. I finshed it (56,000+) in 26 days, jotting down my progress on the white board in the kitchen for my then roommate to check.

I loved every excruciating, seemingly adrenaline-packed minute of it, and I couldn’t wait till the next time. Well, the next time is upon me, and I think I’m opting out. There is another book that’s been clawing at me and, while I mention it from time to time, I’ve pretty much ignored it.

The thing is, I officially completed the first draft about a month ago. The aforementioned former roommate of mine pointed me to the light of a two-parter (like I need the stress), and I understood. So having hit a wall where I last left off – somewhere in my mid-20s – it was a welcome conversation. I felt left off some hook I hung for myself. And I was drying. The draft, ambling along toward 272 pages as I was, had become stale. It was like a doorstop. Like that box of paper next to the desk you recycle. I hated it, and I grew sick of the details. Race, gender, sexuality, class, blah, blah, blah.

But I have to write it. So rather than trying to write another novel for NaNowriMo this year, I’ve decided to dedicate some time to hopping to my memoir. I am officially working on the second draft. It’s time to edit. Fill out. Color. Find the emotion that I tend to leave out.

My fear is to failure. To be considered something less than what I am. It’s the audience I have to ignore for now. Those voices that tell me my story’s been told. That we don’t need another goddamn memoir. That just because my upbringing wasn’t marked by abuse, I have some things to contribute. People, whether in the States or here in Australia, still remind me by their stares that I have to say these things. To remind them that there is substance in otherness.

The main character I had in mind for my 2008 NaNoWriMo project will have to stay in my head for another year. Instead, I will edit, rewrite, and edit again the pages of my memoir. It starts on page one and it begins tomorrow. Again. Promise.

The Writing Shaft

In about 15 minutes, I’m going to get my assignment for round 1.5 of the NYC Midnight Madness Creative Writing Challenge. Starting at midnight in NY (and 2 p.m. Saturday my time), I will have 48 hours to complete a 1,000-word short story.

A few weeks ago I played the same waiting game for round 1 when I finally received notice I was to write my story in a romantic genre in a roller coaster, making sure somewhere in there I included a straw. I hope I fare a little better in this round than I did in the last. If I don’t get enough accumulative points between the two, then I’m done with the contest. But so far, it’s been fun.

So how did I fare last time? Well, uh, okay so there are 15 people in my group. I finished 13th with three points. The first person in my group got 25. (Ahem.) Additionally, the two people below me didn’t have points. There were zeroes by their names. And according to the rules, the lowest you can get is 1. So I’m thinking they didn’t participate. So (ahem) I came in last.

I think I’m okay with it. It actually kind of made me laugh. I thought about the story. The cheesiness of it. I thought about all those messages for artists and writers and painters and other muse chasers that rejection is part of the process. Like death is part of life. It’s a learning process and all that. I down with that.

Still, it was a bit funny. I got great feedback after I posted it on the public forum. Putting it out there like that was a big enough move in itself. So it’s all good. And, really, kind of amusing.

Well, a little sound alerted me to the reception of my latest assignment. Shall we take a look? Hmmm. Looks like they sent the link to the standings instead of the assignment. Awesome. Gonna go get some coffee then.

Orwellian Diaries

Having finished 1984 a couple of days ago, it was cool to see a piece in the NY Times a bit after the fact about a new blog called The Orwell Prize. It’s old news, but new to me. The gist:

The Orwell Prize, Britain’s pre-eminent prize for political writing, is publishing George Orwell’s diaries as a blog. From 9th August 2008, Orwell’s domestic and political diaries (from 9th August 1938 until October 1942) will be posted in real-time, exactly 70 years after the entries were written.

Samuel Pepys’s peeps have been posting his diaries for years. Let’s hope for more. Let’s see…Dickens, George Eliot, Maugham. While I would prefer reading these things the old-fashioned way, it’s interesting to see words of more than 100 years ago — centuries in some cases — meet the structures of the Web. You know. Links and stuff.

Home And Some Stats

I made it back to our place in Brisbane Monday afternoon. When my head finally hit the pillow, everything from the previous three weeks rushed through my head in the ninety seconds before I fell asleep. To say I need a rest after my vacation is not telling the entire story.

Existential crisis averted…though not completely
Before I left for the States, I had concerns about whether the story of mine I want to tell was worthy of telling. I found and took to heart every reason I could find to help deem it an unworthy tale. And this usually happened in the early part of the morning while everyone slept. Not a good time for certain thoughts.

But I’m focused. And my plan involves finally writing without thinking. Writing what I know. And, most important to me, telling a story that just might be able to help if only a couple of people realize they’re not alone. I also wouldn’t mind a best seller. The conundrums of the mind.

In addition to writing, I will research agents and publishers. Despite the fact that people in the business, suggested I might want to tighten up about fifty or so of my already-written pages and shop it around. “No way,” I said to them, confident that I would bust out the book to its completion, then search. Well, about two weeks ago I changed my mind. With an un-finished manuscript, I will spend some time poking agents. Someone should know I’m working on this, whether they want it, lest someone else, with a similar story, beats me to it.

The trip
I had many great dinners with many great people. I even tasted the wonderful flavor of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale. There’s little to nothing like it where alcohol is concerned. And I spent a few of the best days I’ve had with my mom ever, despite her, as she calls it, “loopiness.” I return, as well, knowing the future’s been here this whole time and that I’ve been wasting it till now. It’s time to finally start trying while being unafraid to fail.

I also went to Powell’s bookstore. It has to be one of the most magical places in the world. After meeting a friend and basketball teammate from high school at its cafe, Alia and I took to our own adventure throughout the building. A city of books, it’s dubbed. Taking up a city block, Powell’s has a few floors and rooms divided by subject and given colors as names. I perused the gay book section before heading to the Lincoln section, where I picked up two books to buy. And then I decided to look for a memoir, so I went back to the front to study the massive key that explained where everything was.

“Can I help you?” a short, slim, blond woman in her early-to-mid 40s who looked ten years older than she was interrupted my concentration.

“Yeah,” I said without turning fully around to face her because I was still somewhat in awe of the six-column key in the sky. “I’m looking for your memoirs but don’t see them up there.”

“We organize memoirs by subject matter,” she said with a tone that suggested I was the stupid one. “What’s it about?”

I suddenly forgot, because my memoir (you know, the one that’s not quite finished yet) popped into my head. I wondered where they’d put mine.

“Okay, how about a memoir by someone with her own ambiguous race issues, no father, grew up on welfare, an alcoholic mother. Oh and who’s gay?”

“Social sciences, gay studies.” She paused. “Maybe African American.” Nice. Cross-referenced.

I gave her the name of the previous author and didn’t end up buying the book. One day.

Alia and I left. I love Portland.

Some trip stats:

• Slept in six different places
• Flew six airlines
• Visited four cities
• Acquired five books
• Saw the original manuscript of Jack Kerouac’s On the Road
• Saw Mariel Hemingway
• Sipped absinthe
• Ate buffalo wings! Twice!

There’s gotta be more. But for now, this is it. I’m glad I went. I’m happier I’m back.

Monday’s Big Doings

On Monday, after more than a month off, I plan on resuming work on my book. I’m going to attempt to bring some of my attitude from NaNoWriMo into it. By that I mean to avoid stopping at every period and editing what I’ve just written. I’ll try to accept that the first draft is a first draft and all that stuff and that I can’t edit it if there is nothing to edit. Perhaps the Lifeline Bookfest this weekend will provide me that kick in the ass I’ve been dodging lately.

Also on Monday, Meredith starts her job in her role as a newly graduated surgical theatre nurse. She’s nervous and excited. And I am, too. I hope she can get me the dark-blue scrubs. Now if only she’d stop asking me if she can practice drawing blood.

Days of Birth

Today is mine. It’s lovely. It’s hot. It’s humid. It’s in August. It smacks of insomnia at this point, as I drink what must be my fifth or sixth iced soy chai. (I’m pretty sure they’ve all had a fair amount of caffeine in them.)

It’s not like I haven’t tried to sleep. I did. Around 12:05 I turned my lights out and set my alarm. I think I actually managed to fall asleep. But it wasn’t deep. It was more like the kind where your eyes are closed, and you seem able to think clearly despite the muddled attempts brought on by impending unconsciousness. My right arm was hanging over the side; it’s the same arm that I pushed a little out of the socket the other day, accidentally of course, so it’s a little sore. And all of a sudden, I picked it up, in the middle of my attempt to sleep, and slammed it on the side. Or rather, it did this on its own. Not hard, mind you. Just enough to wake me completely up. No biggy. I’ll easily fall back.

Not so. Because here I am, wondering if this will be another night lying awake till 4:30 or so thinking about rearranging my small room, or my workout schedule next week (should I start now?), or the fact that I’ll have to thaw out my talapia filets in hot water when I cook them next (can’t do that now).

What I won’t do is continue transferring old posts from my other, near-death, blog. I can’t bear it now. I should be done next week. It’s a strange thing to revisit old times. Each post seems so rushed. And I vowed not to write like that anymore. Yet, here I am, trying to rush this one out, trying to feed my new space, so I can hurry up and try to sleep again.

It’s a writing exercise. Yeah, that’s it.

I ran into an old co-worker from my stint in the records office at New School. That was a trip. We sat in the broken-down-air-conditioner hot air of the R train trying to converse across the aisle. Unlike yesterday, this aisle was free of tourists. But it wasn’t working, so I stood next to the train driver who kept his door open, I’m assuming because of the stale air. It was fun talking about the school that, she said, was trying to go corporate. How does that work? Leave it to New School to try and put on a commercial air. Project Runway, I’m sure, is helping.

Today’s my 33rd birthday. I’m pretty happy about that. Stories will resume at another time when I am at my most wakeful.

Live-Blogging Their Blind Date

I’m hanging at a cool place (defined as such because of the beer selection) called Ini Ani in the lower east side. I hear there are many “cool” places in the lower east side, but the neighborhood bores me if I can be honest. It tries too hard. I wrote about it a while ago, but am too lazy to look for the post. And since I’m not writing about the lower east side, why waste the time? The tables in the place are small and a tolerable distance away from one another. But the space doesn’t leave much room to spread the tables out, so I can hear all the conversations going on around me. If that’s what I really wanted. Now, as I don’t really want to, I managed to tune most of the other two out. But not the third one. The guy showed up first and pulled out a hardcover book. I forgot to note the title. He looks like he’s a buff kind of guy, because he has a shaved head. Now, men with shaved heads don’t, as a rule, always seem buff, but for some reason, this one does. Maybe it’s the way his polo shirt clings to his biceps, which, now that I strain to glance at him sideways, don’t seem to be all that large. The dude behind the counter asks him if he’d like anything and he half stood up awkwardly to say that he was meeting someone. “But do you have green tea?” Yeah, the bartender says. Good to know, I guess, for when his situation shows up. Before he can really crack open the book and dive in, this woman shows up. “Men who enjoy sweets are more open-minded, easier to get along with. Nicer.” What? (This is actually the point at which I whipped out my laptop.) She continued. “And men who don’t like sweets are sticks in the muds.” This nicotine-stenched woman knows a lot of sweet men apparently. And based on this, she has developed this theory. I’m unable to get a really good look at her, though, because that would be rude. She’s sitting about three feet away from me. And I’m just not good at subtlety sometimes. I’m wondering if the guy thinks she’s some kind of a nut job. But just because I think she is, doesn’t mean he has to. I open my left ear a little more because now I’m hooked. “That’s an interesting theory. I know a lot of sweet guys who don’t like sweets, though. That’s just my experience.” Yes. They’re really having this conversation. I haven’t gotten his scoop yet. He seems to be the more intuitive of the two. But then again she did tell him she knew he liked sweets. “Well, enough about me,” she says just as I think she’s not only crazy but selfish, too. “What about you?” “What do you do?” Wait. That’s not the answer. But before she can tell him: “How old are you?” Slow down, I can’t type that fast. Forget it. I can’t get it all down. Had I the energy for a writing exercise, I’d have made all kinds of shit up. But then would that be too James Frey? (More on that later.) She’s thirty-eight. And a leo (wasn’t happy to hear that). And to my shock, she’s a development specialist who works with developmentally disabled children. She’s assisting in the development of children. And she’s been doing so for fifteen years. I never did find out who they were to each other or how they came to meet for the first time at Ini Ani. My guess is that she sent him a picture, taken when she was twenty-five, in response to his Match.com profile. But who knows?

For the Love of Books

I had a grand plan to detail the exhilaration I felt when I walked down Madison Ave. tonight and happened upon Oxford University Press. But that was about five hours ago. Now I would prefer to just get to it.

It’s no secret that I’ve lived in New York for more than two years. And the whole time I’ve been aware of the existence of major book publishers. I even entertained the thought of interning at Routledge, something that was once a dream of mine. But the pull has never been so great as to make me go in search of the building where so many amazing books have been published, some of which are in my bookcases. Tonight, though, walking by this prolific publisher of books almost knocked the wind out of me.

Andrew and I were leaving our sitcom meeting, which consists of three writers that Anna says is the beginning of a bad joke (A Jew, a dyke and a Persian walk into a bar — or, as the case was tonight, a Starbucks. The punchline was lost on all of us, but we enjoyed it nonetheless.)

A Guy Named Vince

I was at work on Friday and ran into my friend Andrew who is also one of the editors of Canon. He asked me if I had heard about my essay. I hadn’t.

He then told me that I got second place in the essay contest! Nice! There is money involved. Nicer!

It should be out in two weeks. I asked him who got first. Vince. “Vince C.?” I asked. Vince C.

When I first got to New School, we had to endure a week of registration activities/meetings. One of them was the Liberal Studies lunch. This was where I met the other people in my cohort and got to meet Jim Miller, the chair of the department. He discussed theses. He discussed Vince.

Jim holds Vince in high regard and said that he wrote one of the best theses he had ever seen. I finally met him last semester and he’s a really nice guy. He’s in his forties and went through my program. He’s now pursuing a Ph.D. in Sociology at New School. And he’s intelligent as hell.

And I finished behind him in the contest. That’s about a guy named Vince. I’m happy. I’m happy with the outcome of the essay and I’m glad that this topic of mine will finally see the light of day. I made some decisions this past week concerning writing and “this topic” as a result of the essay being published.

I need to move on. It will always be a part of me, of course. But I can’t keep re-hashing the same shit. So I will move on. My thesis on Hedwig and the Angry Inch will be the last of these issues. My identity issues. I want to start incorporating them into a new form of writing. I’m not sure of the form yet.

But I refuse to put pressure on myself to find it until after the semester. Maybe fiction. Or playwriting. I do want to write a book. About my life so far. And this will all be a part of it. But it’s got to be fresh. I don’t want to use the same tired words. What I’ve written during the past five or so years has been the same.

And it’s lacked emotion. I actually think that the essay that got second place lacks emotion. So I will try harder. To feel what I write and then put those feelings into words. This is something I’m not very good at yet. And I want to be. But that’s for later.

I just spent the last five hours cleaning up the northwest corner of my room. I had two file cabinets that contained old files and dusty piles. The result of my winter cleaning is four bags of trash and four bags of shredded paper. Hopefully the order I achieved tonight will keep itself for a while. At least until I move. Which I really hope won’t be this May.

My lease ends at the end of April. It’s not that I love this place that much to want to stay. I just don’t want to have to deal with finding a place before the end of the semester. Even this summer. I want to relax. Or something. I haven’t made any significant progress on my thesis in a couple of days. I’ve been thinking about it some, but haven’t been staring at the screen. I met with Helen today at the Tea Lounge and we talked a little bit about our respective projects.

She spoke with Jim after class the other night and he said she just needs to write. That editing is the fun part. I have a problem in that I can’t leave a sentence I’m not happy with. I can’t put a period on crap.

So I sit there and look at it and try to think of ways to make it better. And then I think about the paragraph it’s killing and wonder if it’s in the right place. “Should this be in chapter two,” I ask myself (in my head).

In my head is where the words bounce off each other as my fingers rest dormant on the home keys. And I stare. And think. And get up. I can see this thing, this paper I’m writing. And I want to get to the next page. But if I can’t get this sentence to work then I’m stuck.

And the pressure builds up to a point where my thoughts can no longer move. “Maybe I should watch the scene again,” I say to myself (in my head). And I do. And then more thoughts come. And I can see this thing. But I can’t write it into fruition. But I must. And I will. I needed to clean this corner in my room. And I will take Jim’s advice. And just write.