This trip has been a whirlwind of cities and towns in the UK and in France, with no more than two nights spent in each place. In just two weeks, we (my brother Sherwin and I) have traced a meandering clockwise route around Scotland, with a quick drop down to France, and then continuing around England back up to Manchester, where we started. We have been couch-surfing, dropping in on strangers in each place and sleeping wherever they have space for us, wearing the same clothes for more days in a row than we normally would, and being, for much of the time, rained upon. It has been a lot of fun, and I wouldn’t trade these experiences, but I have not been comfortable for more than a handful of moments on the trip.

We were in Fort William, Scotland a week ago, and staying with a Polish fellow named Piotr. Piotr was a very talkative guy, and within the first half-hour of staying with him, we had somehow already gotten into a existential conversation about comfort. I don’t remember how it started, but I can remember Piotr asking “what is comfort?” Now, Piotr was talking about physical comfort, referring to the constant rain, and the circumstances of sleeping on couches. There was more to it than that – I wish I could remember, but I know he was speaking of the merits of discomfort, how it keeps a person from stagnancy, and perhaps how it is a useful character-building tool. What I do remember is when he asked that question, I immediately thought to myself that comfort is control. This is because at the time, and for most of my time in Europe, I have felt acutely my lack of control. It’s almost physical, like I’ve gone out wearing sneakers but no socks, and it all feels very wrong.

Back home, I am the most in control I have ever been in my whole life. I have lived alone for two years, I’ve recently been single for the longest I have been in quite a few years, I’m out of school but feel empowered by my degrees, and of the two jobs I had, I quit the one where I felt more like an underling, and now I only work at a place where I feel respected enough to work on my own. Most importantly, I have had more money in the last year or so than I had before. I am by no means rolling in it, but I am not literally living paycheck-to-paycheck like I did in college. It sort of startled me the first time I realized that it had become my routine to collect two, sometimes three checks before depositing them, because I didn’t need to use that money.

All that has changed in Europe, and I am very uncomfortable. I am not in control of where I live – instead I live in a new place every two days, and none of this stuff is my stuff. This is perfectly okay, and even exciting, but even this lack of constancy would get tiring after a while. And as I’m staying with strangers and my brother, I am certainly no longer living alone.

Romantically I am still single, but I am constantly with my brother, a person I know better than almost anyone else, but I have never spent this much time interacting with him with very little pause. It’s like being in a relationship. I don’t think we have been outside of each other’s company for more than a half hour the entire trip. And I rather like being alone.

Lastly, and most importantly, I don’t have a job and I barely have money. Through circumstances that would be boring to elaborate on, my money has been accessible during the trip while Sherwin’s has mostly not, so not only am I spending lots of money and not earning any, I am spending two people’s worth of money. (Don’t worry, Sherwin’s money will be accessible when we get home, so it is a temporary situation (is what I keep telling myself).)

This lack of control is exhausting, and I keep feeling myself panic a little. I am learning about myself though. I thought it was important for me to be in control, and it is, but an addendum to that is it is important for me to be in control when it’s possible. I realized this in France when we had some vague instructions as to where we would find our ride from Paris to Angers. My friend Laurene had arranged the ride for us, and while we knew where and when we would meet the driver, we didn’t know how we would recognize him. I told Sherwin I was fine with this scenario, and I was happy to go to bed and just go to the train station in question in the morning. Basically, we’d see what happened, and if it didn’t work out, I said I “wasn’t worried.” Sherwin gave me a nervous look and said he didn’t believe me.

Now, I’m afraid that I have not been the best traveling companion for Sherwin, because I have become stressed out easily when we’ve missed a bus here or there, or been unable to find where we are on a map, or when I fully realized our money situation, so I can understand why he didn’t believe me, but it was true that I wasn’t worried, because I knew the situation was out of my hands. I had sent a text to Laurene asking her how we would recognize the guy, and she hadn’t responded. I knew she had to work early and it was late, so I didn’t want to call her. In my estimation we had done everything we could do. Also, I believe there was a degree of trust involved – I felt sure that Laurene had set us up with a ride that would work out (and it did).

In contrast, most of the times I have been uncomfortable on this trip, I’ve felt I could have been in better control. When we missed the bus, it was essentially our fault. I felt we should always have been able to find ourselves on a map with enough squinting, so it was frustrating when we couldn’t (the times when we didn’t have a map, I was actually less worried about it, so maybe I should just stop bringing a map when I travel). And we certainly could have more carefully assessed our funds before embarking. Money is a big factor, and if I had run out of money for reasons beyond my control, I think I would have been okay. Sure, I would have been a little stressed out, especially if I were in Paris where I don’t speak the language, but I actually find it calming to say to myself, “Emily, there’s nothing you can do about it, so you just have to wait and see what happens.”

As much as I am looking forward to going back to my little kingdom where I’m in charge of everything, I thing being uncomfortable has done me some good. I am curious to do an experiment: I wonder how I would fare alone in a country whose language I didn’t speak, not knowing anyone, and not having a map. I don’t think I would do well without money, but if I ever try it out, I’d like to try to limit myself, bring emergency money but try not to spend it. It would probably be rather freeing in some ways. On the other hand, though I agree with Piotr that stagnancy can be a problem, I quite enjoy my life, and I’m pretty good at keeping it from becoming stagnant while still keeping a degree of comfort and control.

For example, I really like Norman Rockwell. Really, I think he’s the shit – sometimes I have his paintings as my computer background, especially Breaking Home Ties, which reminds me of childhood. But I also really dig The Aiyana Sphere (hello, what’s not to like(and don’t be afraid to click through those NSFW warnings folks, it’ll be okay, I promise)) and I have a bunch of her art in my house. I don’t really think I’m any cooler for liking Rockwell or Aiyana. I mean, I think I promote Aiyana more, because she’s my friend, but when it comes down to just me and my laptop (which is often what it comes down to), I could probably click though about the same number of paintings for either one. Okay, maybe this isn’t a fair comparison because of the whole friendship thing. Another example:

One of my favorite poems is “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” by Robert Frost. Especially when this guy reads it (watch the whole thing, totally worth it). Oh, you’ve heard of it too? But I really dig Beth Ann Fennelly’s “Once I Did Kiss Her Wetly On the Mouth” too. And, like, no one seems to have heard of it. I think with visual arts and with verbal arts, because they are, in most cases, objects rather than events, they take on a stagnancy, no matter how awesome they are. Actually, maybe this even makes them more awesome: no matter how many or how few people have read a poem or seen a painting, it remains as it was when only the artist had seen it. This is not the case for performance arts. Because a performance, though it may be scripted and the script repeated, is a singular event, and the audience, whether it consists of a crowded stadium or a single goldfish, contributes its own energy to the work of art. An audience too small is depressing, and an audience that is too big distances the performer(s) in another way. But when an audience meets that balance of small in number, but big in energy, the performance becomes nearly perfect. If the audience is excited in just the right way, the experience can never be replicated. NOT EVEN WITH A REPLICA.

Seriously, though. Here’s what I do have to say about underground music. It is, on the one hand, unfortunate in how ephemeral and unreachable it seems most of the time – unless you’re right there when it happens, you’re a million miles away. And there are plenty of crap shows that crap people want to brag about because they were poorly attended and that band is never gonna play again, so they know that you will be jealous if they pretend it was awesome. But there are those rare instances – for example my birthday last year (bragging here, but for good reason) when JetFighter got back together for a minute and rocked Mayo Street Arts - where you are at the right place when the right thing is happening, and it’s so good that it can never be recreated – you can’t accurately describe it to your friends, pictures or recordings come out blurry or dark or ultimately unimpressive. All you have is your memory and the knowledge that your memory is slowly contorting.

Now, music-wise, I am just as indiscriminate as with the other arts; I totally dig on famous, main-stream folks, but I also love those secret gems that I’ve found accidentally and then find out that no one else knows. I currently own tickets to see Elvis Costello, Gogol Bordello, and Fiona Apple. Still bragging – it’s gonna be an awesome spring, and I’m psyched. It’s pretty rare that I go to big shows, so all these tickets are something of an anomaly. But when I listen to music at home, I proudly listen to Stevie Wonder after Best Friends Forever, after… well, you get the point. Tonight I wanted to hear some Anna Oxygen. She’s one of the first artists I’ve seen live, at least in the first 10 or so, and also one of the best shows I’ve seen. It was a super intimate venue at Vassar – I was there to see Mirah, but first I had to sit through three other acts I’d never heard of: Janet Pants Dance Theater, Anna Oxygen, and The Blow. This was 2003 – Mirah and The Blow have gotten a lot bigger since (and remain favorites of mine), Janet Pants is performance art, not music, so no one should be surprised not to have heard of her (sorry Janet), but I am continually surprised at the lack of Anna love. I thought I’d find at least one fun video of her on youtube, doing her thing, but just like pictures of Big Foot, this is all I got:

At first I was disappointed – this is not the sort of video that I can share with my friends. It looks like one of the lamest shows ever, and it also looks a lot like the time I saw Anna, which I happen to know was one of the best shows ever. But then I realized that live Anna Oxygen fits into that weird category of things too good to be experienced second-hand, and therefore anyone who attempts to do so will be rewarded only with a video too awkward to actually show other humans (that’s live Anna – her studio albums are slightly (but only slightly) less awesome than live Anna, so they are able to be fully enjoyed from the comfort of your home, and this girl totally recommends you do so).

Today I read over the notes and realized that they are not too terribly understandable – I believe I’ve mentioned my habit of writing cryptic notes in the past, and this was no exception. Luckily, as the notes were retyped from another set of notes about an in-depth conversation, rather than a hastily scribbled down translation of inspiration, I was able to piece the meaning together from my memory. It was, however, necessary to write the revisions out in more detail before actually setting to work, so here, just for fun, are those notes. A little glimpse into my writing process. And for those of you who are not writers, imagine this: I consider the following to be “light” revisions, and I consider the damn thing to be so close to done I can taste it. Imagine that.

1) More Christine Searching:  Christine is Lily’s mother, and when she goes missing, you’d think Christine would go crazy looking for her. And she does, go crazy anyway. I think when I wrote this part I felt like is was implied that she did some searching before fully turning her life over to booze and tears. HOWEVER, not only is “some searching” not quite enough searching, but I don’t even really show the “some searching.” Add at least one scene and several references to “searching” in first third of book.

2) Fewer/ Less Extraneous People: I have a lot of characters, and while this isn’t necessarily bad, I need to possibly edit/ combine some of them, as well as just show fewer scenes with those that I do keep. I like that thing where authors show a little bit from everyone’s point of view, and I seem to attempt to do that here, but the book doesn’t call for it, I don’t do it enough, and I don’t need/ shouldn’t have it. In many cases, the scene would actually be more valuable from the point of view of the main character in the scene. So, edit/ delete several of the scenes.

3) Less Madeleine and Jane?: This suggestion goes along with #2, as Madeleine and Jane fall somewhere in between main characters and extraneous characters. It ha a question mark, though, because I really like them and I think they are important to the story. So, read scenes with Madeleine and Jane with a critical eye, decide if they are indeed important, and if they are, beef up their presence and underline their importance to make them full-fledged main characters.

3.5) Fun Side Activity: make a list of all characters and status as main or secondary, and decide which ones to keep/ combine/ trash.

4) Andrew Needs to be Weirder: My original character sketch of Andrew is Totally Average Guy. The name “Andrew” even means “man.” But that sketch isn’t gonna cut it anymore. Here is what Andrew needs: He needs the be more caring, more creepy, and more of an outsider. Let’s have a flashback where we see is inability to function socially in high school, his relationship with his family, pets, etc. What draws him to care for Lily? Why would he be who he is? Add 1-2 scenes, edit most scenes involving Andrew.

5) The Ending is Weird: Okay, so the ending is a little weird. Maybe a little rushed? Spend a good 5-6 hours over a couple days with the ending to give it the attention it deserves. May change very little, but be sure it is un-rushed and logical (or at least as logical as the rest of the book).

6) Put Lily in the Gorge: We want to see Lily in the gorge. It is a symbolic and lonely place. I’m thinking she goes there in her original quest for home, as well as after she leaves Andrew’s dorm. Add two scenes.

7) Amplify Kidnapping Henry: It is only 70% obvious that the kids are joking about kidnapping Henry. This needs to be more like 100% obvious. Edit one scene.

8) Bring Lily’s Darkness: Lily is one creepy-ass little girl. This needs to be more apparent. More descriptions of her odd reactions, the way her giggles are not seen in her eyes. When we are in her head, we need to be a little worried. Edit all Lily scenes slightly.

8.5) Lily Hates Alida: This goes along with her darkness. Lily has always blamed Alida for her misfortune, and after her death, she blames her even more.

9) Make Police 100% Scary: Christine and Lily are terrified of the police. Right now they just don’t like them. They need to be terrified. Edit several scenes.

10) Make a Rounder Haskell: Mr. Haskell is a creep, but he should be a creep with a soul. Edit several scenes.

11) Roger Not Calling Christine Makes Her a Victim: We talked a lot about Christine’s reactions to others. She blames the world for her own shortcomings a lot of the time. When Roger doesn’t call her to say he has Lily, she is able to comfort herself by telling herself that he is holding this over her, and making her a victim. This little lie keeps her from finding out the truth about Lily sooner. Add to one scene.

12) More Andrew Reaction to Lily Being Gone: I kind of skip over Andrew reacting to Lily’s return to her mom, when this is one of the most important emotional scenes in the book. Add one scene.

13) Miscellaneous Other Things: I need a conversation between Lily and Andrew about Lily’s presence in the dorms being a secret, a flower or two in Chloe’s flashbacks, a couple mentions of Chloe’s first year at Cornell (she is a sophomore after all), present mentions of Chloe continuing to run, and a follow-up on Casper after Grumpert and Maizy die. And that’s all. Whew.

So let me get to my jumbled point. I’ve been reading some essay collections recently – How Did You Get This Number?, This Won’t Take But a Minute Honey, and of course Pulphead for the BoC Book Club (next Wednesday at Longfellow, folks! Free booze & pizza, so read it already) – as well hopping around on a few blogs, and I realized something that I’m afraid is painfully obvious, but I can only admit that it’s news to me. Blog posts are mini personal essays. Or, you know, essais.

Folks, this may solve my blogger’s block. I freakin’ love personal essays, and if I call them personal essais, that means all I have to do it *attempt* to write. I mean seriously though – attempts I can handle, so watch out Phillip Lopate, cause I’ma (attempt to) start blogging like it’s an art. The pressure is OFF!

I’m sure it’s the same for most writers – an idea springs into your mind, a scene or a character or a poem fleshes itself out in your mind. You can’t control it happening, all you can do is hold onto as much of it as you can, by force of will-power, or if you’re smart you have a pen and paper at your fingertips and can jot down the main points, if you’re lucky you have the time and space to write the whole thing down right then, and the ability to keep it going.

I love these little bursts of inspiration – they’re better than candy, almost as good as sex. But for some reason I find I often waste them. Not so with my other cravings. I tend to always meet my food or drink cravings, unless they’re crazy or expensive or unreasonable. I can’t keep my hands off of yarn – I start every knitting project I think up (it’s become a problem). I go for every walk, I watch my favorite movies all the way through, and if it’s a song I need to hear, I listen to it usually more than once, often more than twice. But when it’s writing inspiration, I bask in the moment of inspiration, I feel awesome at having had such an awesome idea. About fifty percent of the time, I jot it down on a scrap of paper, or in a notebook. Fifty percent. Do you realize how many awesome ideas I must have had and forgotten? As for how many of those ideas get translated from my chicken scratch into a fully realized scene… Well the number too embarrassing to figure out.

I made a resolution to myself recently to take the time to write legibly and in full sentences whenever inspiration strikes. This resolution was the result of finding notes to myself that read along the lines of “Ch19: goes to a play with J, runs into T there ala LoPOV.” This is an actual note. I remember the play I had in mind, but I don’t know who “J” is, and I have no idea what “LoPOV” means – something Point Of View is all I can think of, but still notsohelpful.

Anyway, I think this resolution was a good first step towards being a better writer. Now it’s time for another – that every time I am having that craving to write, and I DO have the time and space, I have to do it. And why wouldn’t I? If I’m craving the feeling of keys under my fingers, the spread of a story across a page, then sitting down to it is a treat, not an obligation. Right?

Right??

“The lesson here is to live meaningfully and with as much love as possible, not wasting time on anger or hatred, but I really could not hate cancer enough. I hate you cancer.”

It’s not the ending to a longer piece – this is the whole thing, which makes it better, because we can all imagine an instance where this lesson applies, and specificity is unimportant. Since it’s personal, and I don’t think she’d mind, I’m not naming her here, but if she reads this she can claim it. But heartache aside, I think it’s such a perfectly crafted sentiment, starting with the fullness and sentimentality of love that we feel in the face of a loved-one’s illness, and then switching mid-sentence to the anger we feel often simultaneously with that fullness.

A Peculiarity of Action or Behavior. Quirk.

The story of how I became a writer is a boring one. Or perhaps, the story of how I am a writer is a boring one, and the story of how I became a writer is impossible to tell, because there was never any actual “becoming” moment, unless you count the process of learning how to form sentences and ideas and stories. But I am a writer and have been since before I can remember. End of story.

What makes me the type of writer I am is a more interesting story, or at least a more interesting question, because I myself am not entirely sure of the answer. My style has certainly evolved over the years, as my vocabulary and understanding of the human condition have grown, but one thing has stayed fairly consistent: When people ask me what type of writing I do, I say “fiction.” And then they ask “what kind of fiction?” and I become flustered and again say, “fiction, just, you know, fiction.” But for those who have read and formed opinions of things I have written, the adjective that springs out of most mouths (or pens) when describing my brand of fiction is “quirky.”

At first I was not sure how I felt about being quirky. Honestly, I was surprised so many people (I’d wager a good ⅓^rd of readers) chose that word specifically. The word has kind of a flippant quality to it, like something quirky can’t really be taken seriously—at least that’s how I hear it. I began to feel like people saw my writing as the novel equivalent of that weird sort of airhead, comic-relief character. The Luna Lovegood of stories. When I read something that I would describe as quirky, I usually think it is trying too hard to be weird. Like that guy in college who wore the highlighter-yellow trench coat and the 10-foot long scarf wrapped around seven times with still enough tail to sweep the ground. We get it. You’re different. Or rather, you want to be different. I think this disdain for the trying-too-hard is shared by the general public, and I would rather not be included, especially since I’m not trying very hard at all. I’m reminded of a time when I worked at a restaurant in Maine, and there was a person (who I never actually saw myself) who liked to order a pizza with pickles on it. This individual was not super regular, but ordered from us once or twice a month, often enough that it was definitely “a thing.” This annoyed my boss no end, and he remarked one time that “they’re just doing it to be weird.” This is what gave me pause. Because people sometimes dress and speak and act weird “just to be weird,” but nobody orders weird food on a regular basis solely for the weird factor. I fully believe that this person liked pickle pizza. Hell, I’d even be willing to try it—it doesn’t sound so bad. Also, I didn’t like that boss very much.

The thing of it is, I never try to be quirky, and neither does the pickle-pizza eater. And maybe to be truly weird is to be quirky—just enough that, in reading, the quirk becomes oddly comfortable, familiar even though the weird isn’t your own weird. Granted, I’ve written a contrived story or tried my hand at creating a zany character here or there, with the full intention of being just totally weird about it, but for the most part, I feel like I write from the heart about the world as I see it. I pick up on things that I like or that interest me or are important to me, and mix them all together and make a story out of it. And I guess it usually comes out with a bit of the old quirk.

I’ll provide a little evidence. One could argue that a child as young as five or six is too young to have cultivated a self-conscious façade of fake weirdness, especially in her writing. Here is a poem I wrote about my deceased parakeet at that tender age, arguably my most successful poem to date (note, spelling has been corrected):

Untitled

1. Male

2. Bird

3. Friendly

4. Nice

5. Kind

6. Can carry a tune

7. Green

8. Yellow

9. Blue

10. White

11. Black spots

12. Down

13. Feathers

14. Pretty

15. Handsome

16. Cute

17. Parakeet

18. Trainable

19. Pleasant

20. Whistles

21. Happy

22. Thoughtful

23. Understanding

24. Flies

25. Glides

26. Trendy

27. Beautiful

28. Plain

29. Petite

30. Gone.

(signed) Emily Young, his part time owner, and all time Friend.

Totally weird, right? If not a little heartbreaking. I don’t remember writing it at all. But I feel like the quirkiness here is out of innocence. As a gesture of love, my six-year-old self pulled together a collection of observations, both of the bird itself, and no doubt a handful of favorite words gleaned from overheard conversations. Describing-words. And the words, though lovely, are not the point, and are not there to be admired for their oddness. They are there to build a character, if only briefly, for this bird, so that when it turns at the end, the weight of the loss is felt by the reader. What I didn’t know is that the character I was describing wasn’t the bird so much as myself as a bird lover.

Anyway, I’m still not entirely happy with the term “quirky,” (even though Luna Lovegood was my favorite character from those books), so I took out my trusty Merriam-Webster and GARFIELD Dictionary and explored my options.

Let me pause here to say that I have always relied on the dictionary and Garfield (the cat, not the 20^th president of the United States) for information as well as entertainment. Garfield taught me the value of juxtaposing humor and tragedy for true emotion, as well as who Ralph Nader is. The dictionary introduced me to relationships built on word love—I’ve had more than one friendship that consisted largely of reading bits of dictionary too each other. So you can imagine my joy when I discovered a Merriam-Webster and GARFIELD Dictionary at a used bookstore. Who’s trying to be weird now?

Peculiar; Strange. Queer.

So M-W & G’s definition of quirky led me to peculiar (which I liked the sound of much better), and peculiar led me to queer. In two moves, I’m already back to the q pages, which number 3 ½ out of 714 pages. Peculiar indeed. I’ve always liked the word queer. I immediately get an image of a man that doesn’t totally stand out, but there is something appealingly off about him. Perhaps he wears all brown—a rather unassuming color—but he wears a little bit too much brown. Not just his suit and shoes are brown, but his socks as well, are exactly the same shade, like the person who colored him in only had the package of 12 crayons instead of 96. Queer.

According to Garfield (and Merriam and Webster), quirky and queer are basically synonyms, although I still hold that there is a subtle difference between the two (otherwise, we wouldn’t have two different words—right? Right??). I would much rather be queer, which seems inherent, than quirky, which seems affected. So here is my argument for queer, illustrated in the form of another selection from my collection of juvenilia. The following is a chapter from my first novel (which totaled about 700 words) written when I was nine-or-so years old. All you need to know so far is that Spud and Lilac are sibling dogs, and June and Jackie are their owner’s daughters (two of three triplets, natch):

Spud and Lilac: Chapter II Lilac & the Possum

One morning, when Spud was investigating the barn, Lilac decided to take a walk in the woods. As she walked along taking her time she saw something move in the bushes.

Lilac growled a low growl at the bush and a little raccoon jumped out. It was the same raccoon that she and her brother had seen on their last adventure. She could tell by the black spot on his back.

Lilac chased him all around the woods until they came to a big oak tree and then the raccoon hid in the bushes. Lilac couldn’t find him, all she could find was a possum hanging in the oak tree. Lilac tried to climb the tree and get the possum 12 times with no success. That night Lilac went home very tired and all she could think about was the possum. She thought about this so much that she couldn’t finish her supper that night.

Since then every day for 2 weeks, she and her brother would go there and that same possum would be hanging from that same tree every time.

But one day Spud over heard June say that she lost her toy possum and then Jackie said she saw it in the oak tree out back. The dogs had been tricked! The possum was just a toy!

Seriously, where was I coming up with this stuff? Who has a toy possum? —possums are scary looking. The thing is, I didn’t think so at the time. I don’t know if I had ever seen a possum before, but they were my favorite animal back then, and I didn’t think there was anything weird about them. Is that quirky? More queer I think. Like I said, I’m going to own the quirkiness of my writing at any rate. Sometimes the masses are right. But since I make the rules, I’m going to own my queerness too. And if I’m going to go on about adjectives that start with q in relation to my writing style…can I be quixotic too? Can I afford not to be?

Foolishly Impractical Especially in the Pursuit of Ideals. Quixotic.

I’ve been drawn to the word quixotic since I first heard it. It’s horribly awkward in a very appealing way, and therefore I think that, aurally, it describes it’s own meaning perfectly. Plus, if you try to pronounce the “quixot-” part the same way you’d pronounce it in “Don Quixote,” you just sound like you’re saying “chaotic,” which is a confusion I can relate to. Aside from how the word sounds coming out of one’s mouth, the notion itself is romantic and sad in the best way. “Foolishly impractical esp. in the pursuit of ideals”—I didn’t expect a dictionary definition to make me emote, but I must say, this one has that effect.  Foolishly impractical—I think I subconsciously strive to have a quixotic character in everything I write. I strive for situations that just won’t work out. And I think, in my youth (I smell another example, don’t you?) I was quixotic myself, and sometimes wrote about situations without realizing the hopeless impracticality of the characters’ motives. Take, for example, this short story I wrote at about eight years old:

Magic!

Once there was a little girl named Chezley McQuinsen. Her best friend’s name was Jonathan Dunkley.

There was one thing that Jonathan didn’t know about Chezly and that was that she was a white witch.

One day Chezly, her little sister Erica, their canary Hubert, and Jonathan were all sitting in Chezley’s attic.

“I’m bored,” said Erica, I think I’ll go watch TV.”

“I’ll go too,” said Jonathan.

“Not so fast,” said Chezly. “Now that my sister is gone, I want to tell you something……”

They went in to their secret hide away. Then Chezly said, “Guess what?……I’m a white witch! I can make magic, want to see some?”

“Sure.”

Poof!! She turned him into a camel. Poof!! She changed him back.

“Oooohhhh Joonnaathhaann ….” said a singsong voice.

“Oh that must be my mom.”

“I have an idea, I’ll shrink you and you can live with Hubert. That way you won’t have to go home.”

That’s how Jonathan got into the cage.

THE END

I remember distinctly being the kid that would hide from my parents when it was time to go home. Every time. I hope it was adorable, but I’m sure it was annoying. I would spend the last half-hour with whatever friend I was visiting agonizing about having to go home soon, and when the time came, I’d whine and drag my feet and beg for a little more time. I’m sure the above story was not the first time I imagined a way to stay longer. But what’s up with that last line? Not “THE END,” the part right above that. Okay, I take back what I said before, I must have known how hopelessly impractical this was, to shrink a friend into staying longer. And I clearly found the notion to be delicious. Now Chezly’s best friend is essentially a toy—and there is no mention of Jonathan’s consent here. Did I know that “white witch” was supposed to mean “good witch”? Or did I mean evil, and incidentally Caucasian?

Not unlike Don Quixote, Chezly has deluded herself safely into an ideal, in this case the extended friendship provided by shrinking his friend and caging him. I’m not going to look into it too deeply, I mean, it was written by an eight-year-old, but still. What a queer little story. How quirky.

My intentions in writing “Magic!” are debatable—it’s likely that I was more interested in the idea of magic than what my characters actions say about each other. This is one way in which my writing has evolved: more and more, I write with intention. And I don’t simply mean that my writing has become more directional since I was eight-years-old, as this is (hopefully) true for any writer. As someone who grew up with a psychologist for a mother, on top of my writer’s curiosity, I find myself observing people and situations and really trying to figure out why and how everything comes to be. And how I can make it fit together in a pleasing manner. It feels cliché to say I want to write about and understand the human condition, but it also feels true.

My writing has also been informed over the years by my peers and by authors I admire, those to whom my work is similar and those whose work I’d like to aspire to. I’ve had people tell me my writing style is similar to that of Kurt Vonnegut and Toni Morrison—a bit overly flattering for sure, but I can see it in the simple yet often intense, sometimes rambling voice my narratives tend to have. There is something all my own in there, too. My writing is so much more about the character and how they tell it than it is about what they tell. The story is revealed in tone more than in the actual events described.

But we’re getting away from the letter Q. I know, it’s a gimmick, but I think it’s important. It’s holding my preface together, and it’s also demonstrating a very important point that I’ve learned as my writing has developed: that a piece of writing needs to have both an idea and a structure, but the two don’t always have to make sense together, at least at first. In fact, it’s often better if they don’t, because the challenge is in making it work. Good writers thrive on challenge, or else they get lazy and their writing deteriorates. This is important to know. So let’s have another Q.

Comically Quaint.

This definition isn’t quite what I want, true though it may be.

Expressive of Puzzlement, Curiosity, or Disbelief

We’re getting closer here.

Mildly Teasing or Mocking. Quizzical.

In fact all three definitions of quizzical feel right to me. The same part of me that is uncomfortable with the word “quirky” is also uncomfortable with the word “quaint.” Even though I like quaint things (it means “attractively unusual”), the word itself leaves a little bit of condescension residue in my ears. The second definition is a little better—the idyllic, child part of me is forever quizzical in this way; curious, discovering, amazed and confused. But what I’m really talking about, when we get down to it, is teasing and mocking. Humor is my jam. And one of the most important realizations I’ve had—and I say realize instead of learn, because I believe this is one of those things that everyone knows inherently—is the importance of humor. Humor births joy, but it is also the crutch of those who are afraid. In real life, its presence is inevitable, even in the most dire of situations, and it provides a juxtaposition for other emotions. I believe humor belongs in writing no matter what. Humor is the quirk that hides in life’s seriousness. And if humor is a quirk, that’s the quirk I want.

Nerdiness aside, I just wanted to talk about how awesome reoccurring characters are, and in this case I am referring to characters that appear in more than one work, usually by the same author, but not in a series. I’m looking at you, Kurt Vonnegut and Toni Morrison. Granted, I do love a good series or trilogy, but with those it’s still like an extra long novel. You are still in generally the same storyline, and more importantly, within one arc. When one simply has reoccurring characters, it instantly puts the reader in a whole world that is bigger and more dynamic than the books are individually. Things can happen to the characters that are never chronicled in the actual story. With a series, it is really best to not leave gaps in a character’s life, because they will be labeled as plot holes, but if you are not telling the story of that character’s life all in one narrative, you’re allowed those holes. In fact, I’d argue that it’s better that way.

What I’m getting at here is I’ve just finished an advanced draft of a novel, and I’ve realized that I can include the protagonist as a minor character in both of the other projects I’m working one. In Darling, the project I am using for my MFA thesis, Lily is nine years old. And I just figured out a way to show her at ages 10 and 18 as well. And who knows what will happen after that!