This was a good read, man. Especially for me, a beard-and-glasses brigade member who’s knocking on 40 and finally started professionally writing, for real this time, soon after the pandemic started. It’s been working out for me, sometimes feels like a little too well, and I’m mortified that I’ll be pegged for a fraud soon, but I finally feel like I’m where I should be, even if I started a little late.
Your wife’s advice is the same attitude I’ve gone into this with. I might be old and maybe I won’t get as far as someone who really went for it in their 20s, but I wasn’t going anywhere as a bartender, a pizza shop manager, or a beer delivery guy, and I hated being on the road or doing social media as a musician, so why not dig in and do the thing I wanted to do and didn’t have the guts to when I was a teenager and 20-something? The bar is always waiting if I have to go back, but writing may not be. Unless I wanna go all Cormac McCarthy and be a mysterious old man with the most horrifying stories.
Anyway, this post is encouraging. Thanks for sharing it.
Right on! So great to track yr journey from afar (& twitter)
This was so beautiful to read. I teared up at the end.
Emily is a GEM.
Congratulations on The New Yorker!!!
This was a good read, man. Especially for me, a beard-and-glasses brigade member who’s knocking on 40 and finally started professionally writing, for real this time, soon after the pandemic started. It’s been working out for me, sometimes feels like a little too well, and I’m mortified that I’ll be pegged for a fraud soon, but I finally feel like I’m where I should be, even if I started a little late.
Your wife’s advice is the same attitude I’ve gone into this with. I might be old and maybe I won’t get as far as someone who really went for it in their 20s, but I wasn’t going anywhere as a bartender, a pizza shop manager, or a beer delivery guy, and I hated being on the road or doing social media as a musician, so why not dig in and do the thing I wanted to do and didn’t have the guts to when I was a teenager and 20-something? The bar is always waiting if I have to go back, but writing may not be. Unless I wanna go all Cormac McCarthy and be a mysterious old man with the most horrifying stories.
Anyway, this post is encouraging. Thanks for sharing it.