As of early this morning, these stairs are covered with snow. And the poor flowers as well…
*sigh*
On Mondays, I get my spine adjusted. My chiropractor is an interesting person. He’s very young — as it’s been explained to me, people get out of high school a lot earlier in the UK and Commonwealth countries (he’s from Sydney, Australia), and university tends to be about three years long, if you specialize, so there are many doctors here who are, oh, 21 or 22, and already fully-fledged and seeing patients. My chiropractor has been away from University — where he got a Master’s degree, which takes a year — for four years now, so I assume his age to be, at oldest, about twenty-six. Maybe.
I’d never ask him how old he is, just out of courtesy, and the idea that maybe he should retain some dignity and mysteriousness as a medical professional, but this doesn’t stop him from asking me things — he’s intensely curious about Americans, California, and San Francisco. But, his favorite question? “So, how’s the writing coming?”
Oh. My. WORD. He doth not know how he transgresseth.
There’s no other profession on earth in which people are asked so often for a progress report — except for students in school. Do you remember being an elementary school student, and hearing the question from adults or relatives you didn’t see very often? “So, honey, how’s school? Do you know what you want to be when you grow up?” Did it make you consider lightly belting the speaker with something blunt and guaranteed to leave a bruise? That’s kind of how that writing question makes me feel sometimes, only we could leave off the word “lightly.”
I think my chiropop is a lovely person, too, so it’s not personal that a few weeks ago I walked away from his office and stomped up the street, gasping and shoving down sobs, determined not to cry on public transportation. It had nothing to do with him, and everything to do with me and my perspective on how well I was not doing.
What a weird society we have, when a certain segment of the population is only as good as their next production. I mean, do we go around asking parents of toddlers, “So, how’s motherhood? When’s are you starting the next one?” Or should I, as my friend L. suggests, ask my chiro-guy, “How’s your client base? How are your skills coming?” Would any of us ask these things so casually if they could be asked right back?
It’s not just that it’s a nosy question — it is, of course, but it can be asked among friends — but it’s a question that creative people struggle to answer to themselves every day, and every time they sit at their desks or look in their mirrors, or awaken in the wee sma’ hours, wondering if they shouldn’t just give up and keep working for the insurance company. Running ourselves into plot-walls, writing passive main characters, only to have to rip them out and start over, staring at our cursor blinking — sometimes writers can barely face themselves, much less other people. And yet, strangers, friends, relatives — people ask.
Because they really do want to know.
So, Monday, I went back to the spine doctor, and sat and breathed deeply and stretched — and then froze, as he asked the one question I’d been hoping he could avoid:
Doctor C.:“So? How’s the writing going?”
Me, on the table: Okay, look. I’m going to have to lay a boundary with you on this. You can’t keep asking me how the writing’s going.
With a classic expression of dismay: “Why not??? I won’t tell anyone.”
Are you laughing as loudly as I wanted to? Oh, good.
After he explained he’d never had a writer as a patient, and found the whole thing fascinating, and I explained that he was going to have a psychotic writer as a patient if he didn’t rein in the curiosity, I caved and told him what he wanted to know, that YES, I HAVE FINISHED MY MANUSCRIPT, and am almost ready to start on something else.
And then he asked me what types of things I like to read. Now, that I can talk about all day…
I don’t get told a lot about other people’s writing anymore — people are forever telling me what I should write, though — usually THEIR story. As if I have no curiosity and imagination of my own. My usual advice is to turn the tables on them and invite them to write their own story, as no one can tell it as they can…
This cracked me up too. But I have to disagree about one thing: when we had only one kid, I stopped counting the times people asked me when we were going to start on #2. Some even went so far as to lecture us to hurry up and get cracking: check out clerks, neighbors, and #1’s nursery school teachers — they all had their obnoxious opinions on my reproductive plans. It got to be a royal pain-in-the-butt. I got so good at cold, tight-lipped smiles. Maybe this only happens in Japan, though…
No one asks me how my writing is going. They tell me about their plans to write and occasionally they ask me if I’ve published anything.
Seriously, Tanita? This is so funny and full of courage at the same time. Lordy, sister…
At least it’s somewhat better than unsolicited soliloquies on THEIR writing projects. I was talking to the bank employee yesterday–WaMu is officially becoming Chase now, meaning I had to verify everything–and while we were sitting there making small talk (which I hate anyway) he tells me about his diet memoir book. Sigh…
To be fair, he didn’t go on and on about it. But then, I didn’t display a lot of interest beyond polite “mm-hmms”.
Okay, you made me laugh. Belly laugh. That’s almost as good as an adjustment.
My yoga teacher asks about my writing all the time, but I have no problem with it because she writes too and if I just want to grunt in reply, she’s okay with it. 🙂