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I’m writing from a whirlwind of my own creation.
Just this week, I spoke at a rotary club, a high school, and a book festival. Over the next month, I have sixteen events, including a fifteen-hour round trip drive to Baton Rouge and back for the Louisiana Book Festival.
I see you rolling your eyes, probably thinking: “Hey, kid, this is what you signed up for, isn’t it?” Or maybe, you’re leaning more toward comparison, something like: “That ain’t nothing. Taylor Swift’s tour had 52 stops!” To which I’d counter that T Swift doesn’t have any kids who come with their own schedule chock full of extracurricular events like swim team, gymnastics, piano lessons, parent-teacher conferences, etc.
If it sounds like I’m complaining, it’s because I am, even though I don’t really hate being busy. In fact, I seem to thrive when there’s a lot on my plate. My wife’s the same way. We like our days filled to the brim, overflowing with activities, sending us bouncing from one thing to the next.
But there’s part of my life where being busy isn’t helpful, and that’s my writing time.
Stephen King once said, “People with a high tolerance for boredom can get a lot of thinking done.” And of course, The King is right (he’s always right). How this translates for me is that when there’s too much on my plate, the first thing to go is the quality of my writing.
Emphasis on “quality.”
I don’t stop writing. I’m too much of a drudge for that. I’ll still set my alarm, still brew some coffee and lumber down to the office at five every morning, but the product is pure crap. My mind’s too busy, already jittering ahead to the day’s to-do list.
This, however, can be remedied by exercising a little self-control. The secret is to approach the desk like a cat.
Yes, you read that right. A cat.
The thought came to me at my desk one morning when I should’ve been writing but instead was watching my black cat Binx sneak around the office. In her exquisite craft book, “Writing Down the Bones,” Natalie Goldberg explains that “the cat’s mind is not thinking about how much money he needs, or whom to write a postcard to when he visits Florence: he is watching the mouse or the marble rolling across the floor or the light reflecting in crystal.”
But how? I wondered as I watched Binx stalk a stray fishing jig across my office’s concrete floor. How does one assume a catlike disposition in today’s highspeed world?
Simple. Slow down.
Usually, when my alarm goes off, I rush out of bed, already thinking of every little task I want to accomplish. That’s changed lately.
Now, I do my best to wake up slow, to really feel the vinyl tile beneath my toes giving way to cold, hard concrete in the basement. I luxuriate in the taste of my morning coffee, letting Peet’s whole bean dark roast warm me, wake me, from the inside out. I slink toward my desk in the darkness. I creep up on my pen, my pad. And then, when I’m finally settled in my red leather chair, I’m surprised to find the words are already there, waiting for me like they’ve always been.
Don't Know Tough
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In Denton, Arkansas, the fate of the high school football team rests on the shoulders of Billy Lowe, a volatile but talented running back. Billy comes from an extremely troubled home: a trailer park where he is terrorized by his mother’s abusive boyfriend. Billy takes out his anger on the field, but when his savagery crosses a line, he faces suspension.
Without Billy Lowe, the Denton Pirates can kiss their playoff bid goodbye. But the head coach, Trent Powers, who just moved from California with his wife and two children for this job, has more than just his paycheck riding on Billy’s bad behavior. As a born-again Christian, Trent feels a divine calling to save Billy—save him from his circumstances, and save his soul.
Then Billy’s abuser is found murdered in the Lowe family trailer, and all evidence points toward Billy. Now nothing can stop an explosive chain of violence that could tear the whole town apart on the eve of the playoffs. |
Ozark Dogs
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In this Southern thriller, two families grapple with the aftermath of a murder in their small Arkansas town.
After his son is convicted of capital murder, Vietnam War veteran Jeremiah Fitzjurls takes over the care of his granddaughter, Joanna, raising her with as much warmth as can be found in an Ozark junkyard outfitted to be an armory. He teaches her how to shoot and fight, but there is not enough training in the world to protect her when the dreaded Ledfords, notorious meth dealers and fanatical white supremacists, come to collect on Joanna as payment for a long-overdue blood debt.
Headed by rancorous patriarch Bunn and smooth-talking, erudite Evail, the Ledfords have never forgotten what the Fitzjurls family did to them, and they will not be satisfied until they have taken an eye for an eye. As they seek revenge, and as Jeremiah desperately searches for his granddaughter, their narratives collide in this immersive story about family and how far some will go to honor, defend—or in some cases, destroy it. |
| Previous columns: |
• Writing from Creative Writing Class
• Writing from Mom's Knee Surgery
• Writing from Buffet-less World
• Writing from an airplane
• Writing from Mississippi Book Festival
• Writing from Bed
• Writing from Witherspoon Hall
• Writing From: Coco
• Writing from the Beach
• Writing From: Crooked Creek
• Writing from a Nursing Home
• Writing from a Firework Tent
• Writing from a Boat
• Writing from the Stars
• Writing from the Pool
• Writing from the Kitchen
• Writing from Summer
• Writing from Kindergarten
• Writing from Mom
• Writing from a Plane
• Writing from Home
• My second novel’s publication
• A New Marriage Milestone
• An Invitation to the Party
• Writing from a Thunderstorm
• Writing from a Soundbooth
• Writing from “Jazz Beach"
• Writing from the Sabbath
• Writing from somewhere between Little Rock and Russellville
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• Writing from my back deck
• Writing from the morning of my thirty-fifth year
• Writing on the day of the college football National Championship
• Writing from the space between breaths
• Writing from 2022
• Writing from the glow of a plastic Christmas tree
• Writing on a rollercoaster of triumph and disaster
• Writing from the drop-off line at my daughter’s elementary school
• Writing with Thanksgiving on my mind
• Writing from the crowd before the start of a Shovels & Rope show
• Writing from the depths of a post-book-festival hangover
• Writing from the Ron Robinson Theatre
• Writing to you on Halloween Eve
• Writing from my bed on a Saturday morning
• Writing from my office with two darts clenched in my left hand
• Writing from the shade of my favorite tree
• Writing from my desk on a Tuesday morning
• Writing from a pirate ship
• Writing from the airport
• Writing from the hospital
• I'm writing from the water
• Writing from my wife's Honda Pilot
• Writing from my office |
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