Back when I first began writing seriously, I was in my thirties living in New York City. I wrote (in a fictional fashion) about my life ten years prior to that: about when I was in my twenties, living in Minneapolis.
I encountered an idea around that time. Writers tend to write about issues they were grappling with around ten years ago. I don’t know where I first heard this idea; I just did a cursory Google search and could not find its origins. I’m not even sure the idea is generally true. But it’s generally true for me.
Writers write about the things they were most concerned with ten years ago.
Back then, I wrote about slackerhood. Larger thematic issues loomed in the stories. I reread the stories now and I see the common threads in my thinking. I wrote about navigating a life without religion (I grew up Southern Baptist, but abandoned the faith). I wrote about drugs and alcohol, sex and loneliness. I wrote about living on the borderline between youth and adulthood.
That was thirty years ago. My story of the month this month will be one of the ones I wrote way back then. More about that later.
Right now, I find I am still writing, in the same fictional fashion, about what happened ten years ago. What happened ten years ago from now was this: we returned home from a road trip to California and Disneyland to hear of my wife’s diagnosis of early onset dementia. Nothing was ever the same again. We sat the kids down at the dining room table and told them.
I am not as clear about what the emerging themes of my current writing are. I know my chosen genre has shifted from literary to horror. I find I am grappling—and this is true in my real life in addition to my writing life—with my beliefs about pain and loss and struggle and hope. I am writing about building a better life for yourself in the midst of chaos. About trusting the people around you, and trusting the world. About, oddly enough, optimism and resilience.
My apologies to Raymond Carver, whose short story title “What We Talk About When We Talk About Love” I borrowed for the subtitle of this post.
Thanks to all those who bought “Fuck, Marry, Kill” in the last couple weeks. Your support was noticed and much appreciated. The links, yet again:
My latest story: Fuck, Marry, Kill
February’s story: Veronica Scissors
My first novel, Life Under Water
My website: jeffmwood.com.
My Amazon page.
My erotic story series, Serious Moonlight (as J G Cain)
Peace.