(Prelude to a Literary Murder)

If it is truth that you desire then let me explain a few things. But be careful. For where truth is involved there will also be complexity. There are no simple truths. Simplicity is the siren song of the lie. That much, I know a thing or two about, at least.

If it is truth that you desire then let me tell you that I am sick to death of this term Latino Writer. It has nothing to do with me and I want nothing to do with it. If you are asking me if I am Latino then the answer is yes. If you are asking me if I am a Writer then the answer is yes. If you are asking me if I am a Latino Writer, then the conversation stops there. Silencio, por favor. Let me write. Let me be.

If it is truth that you desire then let me tell you that I am desperate to be a Latino Writer. I would pepper my poems with brujas, and taos, and hermanas, if only I knew how. But I do not. There was no Spanish spoken in my childhood. No barrio. No viva la resistance. Just a hard-working but distant padre and a blond-haired blue-eyed mother who did the best she could: traditional hat dance on Wednesdays; taco night on Fridays; a Traje de Gallo gathering dust in the closet when the seven year old revolted. Enough! No more living between two worlds.

I chose hers. It was the only world I really knew.

If it is truth that you desire then I’m truly sorry. No se la puedo dar. I have given you what I can. The only way to get at what remains is to stand over my dead body and dig it from my heart.

(At Trial)

<evidence>

I was in a bookshop recently when a young woman approached me.

She told me she was writing an essay on my work and that of Radclyffe Hall. Could I help?

“Yes,” I said. “Our work has nothing in common.”

“I thought you were a lesbian,” she said.

from “The Semiotics of Sex” by Jeanette Winterson

<direct examination>

Winterson addresses sexual orientation but she might as well address ethnicity. Substitute Junot Diaz for Radclyffe Hall, Latino for Lesbian, and the anecdote reads the same. The L-words loom over us dangerously. Lesbian. Latino. Put either before Writer and to which goes the eye? The L-word. Does it not trouble the reader that, as Winterson puts it, “in any discussion of art and the artist, heterosexuality is  background, whilst homosexuality is foreground”? Generations have fought to remove questions of race, ethnicity, and sexuality from the foreground of our daily experience but in literature it haunts us still.

The read-in of autobiography is the problem. That beginners mistake of literature played out to massive scale. No matter how many times we are told to separate our authors from our speakers and our narrators we simply cannot resist. It is far too easy. Far too satisfying to point to similar scenes in art and life thinking we have discovered some easy element with which to alchemize an understanding of the work. But simply because I have lived some simulacrum of a Latino experience does not mean it must be conjured in my ink. “Forcing the work back into autobiography is a way of trying to contain it,” says Winterson, but she, if anyone, knows that literature cannot be contained.

<evidence>

But confess

that you enjoyed the sad sickness

of meek peoples

and you crept up the Andes

to load up on copper, chromosomes, guns,

from “United States” by Marjorie Agosin

<cross examination>

1. Is it not true that the writer is a member of society?

2. Is it not true that without the medium of society the writer’s words are but meaningless vibrations made in silence?

3. Is it not true that this relationship implies an obligation upon the writer to the society of which he or she claims to be a member?

4. Is it not true that if this society has been oppressed by another then it is the obligation of the writer to first address this oppression before addressing any other subject?

5. Is it not true that when you answered yes to being Latino and yes to being a Writer that in so doing you undertook the obligations of the Latino Writer?

6. Well, didn’t you?

<evidence>

The authors’ task or primary responsibility in this category [the literature of exile and immigration] is to represent or voice information that will raise awareness in the host country so that their countries problems are no longer obscured and are present in the minds of those who have the power to help.

from “Exile and Immigration” edited by Jose Gonzalez

We left Cuba so you could dress like this?

from “We Left Cuba So You Could Dress Like This” by Achy Obejas

<redirect>

The exile, the immigrant, and the acculturated. Yes, the acculturated too. We are here. Even if we are left out of Gonzalez’s address. We are here and we grow in number every day. Desperately simmering like the ropa vieja we have never truly tasted. It fills us none the less. It is our blood. Blood may live along the edges of the body for a while but eventually it longs for the heart. So is it with us.

Don’t we have burdens enough? The exile, the immigrant, and the assimilated. Haven’t we struggled sufficiently just to stand here? Just to take our place in an alien world. Should we wish to bequeath a few measured words to the ages, why set upon us with further obligations? Does anyone ask this of the gringo author? The heterosexual? The male? They write and history judges them by their words before their obligations. It is not an equitable treatment.

­ ­ ­ ­ ­The truth is that obligation rarely concerns itself with what is equitable.

All this time, I have asked myself: “What do I owe a society that I have never truly been a part of it?”  But perhaps there is a better question.

How about this: “What do I owe myself?”

<jury out>

Then here is the verdict: guilty of innocence.[1]

If it is truth that you desire then you are going to have to learn to stretch yourself around a world that you may never comfortably encompass. The world is jagged and rough. This is no task for the feint of heart. It will require near constant re(-en)vis(ion)ing. Through death find the birth to live once again. Put like this, in the familiar Judeo-Christian trope, it may sound simple, but simple it is not.

When faced with complexity the first thing to do is to begin making distinctions. Let us start with this. The truth is that the term Latino Writer means nothing. Society gives it one meaning. You must give it another. And then convince the world that you are right. This is your obligation. This is your truth.

Si, la verdad. Se la puedo dar ahora.

---

[1] Remember: verdict does not equate truth. We have overturned enough of them to know better than that. But verdict is the consensus of society. Even if it is a lie, the truth is that it will be believed by many. That is close enough for our purposes, at least.

Joseph A. W. Quintela wrote this bio between the lines of Virginia Woolf’s  Orlando with the hope he’d be transformed. He wasn’t. There’s just no magic left in the world. So he began to search. One night he closed his eyes and flung himself to sky and didn’t open his eyes until his feet sank into alien soil. The first world was rocky. Barren. He left. The second was made from the tears of his father, shed alone in the night and spun into a planet. He took a breath. Dove into the briny water. Became a golden fish. (http://josephquintela.com/in-writing.html)

Ed: Vallie Lynn Watson recently edited the fine, fine, Writing, Place and Film issue of Rick Magazine and she was kind enough to write a dispatch about her day as an extra on the set of MY FAVORITE TEENAGE SOAP OPERA SET IN NORTH CAROLINA IN THE WHOLE WIDE WORLD or as you may refer to it, the one true show to rule them all, One Tree Hill. If you are a fan of the best show in the whole wide world, you will love every juicy moment. If you are not a fan, I am sad for you.

Had to be at a parking garage at 6:30, and they drove me in one of their ever-present long white vans to Clothes Over Bros, a block away. Went in a side/back door and joined about a dozen other people of all ages/races in a small, sort of hot room. We’d end up being in this room off and on for half the day, toiling in folding chairs. Had to fill out tax forms””I hadn’t even thought about getting paid as I of course would’ve done it for free, but I’ll get about $100 for the day.

I was in four scenes (fingers crossed that they’re all used!). The first two were really taxing: I had to walk back and forth in front of Clothes Over Bros. The first of the two was about nine o’clock, and when I rounded the corner on my walk, I almost ran smack into Austin Nichols (Julian), who looks hot as shit with his hair all curly and unkempt. And then Lee Morris/Norris (?), Mouth—or as I like to call him, Minkus—was right behind him. The scene was the two of them exiting COB, and in most of the shots I was walking right past the front door as they exit. Right when we were finishing all this up, Sophia Bush (Brooke) walked up in the clothes she was filming in a couple days before (a tight, lovely gray and black number and weird heels—they have this bulb-like thing at the bottom of the actual heel).

(By the way, if you wanna try to spot me, this is all for the second episode of the season. I am as short as I always was, my long, blonde, curly [probably frizzy] hair was down, and I was wearing an empire-waist turquoise/green patterned dress that may be too boobalicious and probably makes me look pregnant, though I sucked tummy in with all my might. And was wearing too much makeup).

Back to the waiting room for a couple more hours in the folding chairs. Most everyone was nodding off. It was warm, and they didn’t supply us with coffee! They did provide us with weird (leftoverish) food throughout the day, and water.

About noon, more walking in front of COB. I could see inside that Daphne (Brooke’s mom) and Sophia were filming an argument. At the end of the scene, Daphne exits COB. She looks as mean as I expected. I kinda doubt I can be seen in this shot.

Back to the waiting room, and the nice older ladies I’d made friends with at 6:45 started to get on my two-hours-of-night-before-sleep nerves. They thought it was cute to stand in a line and show off their ballet plies (sp?). I kept going to the bathroom (people probably thought I had some drug problem!) because to get there, you had to go through the middle room that is attached to the actual COB store/set (for those who don’t know, this is an actual space, a former business, in downtown Wilmington). I could see all the cloth chairs with names on them (Brooke, Millicent, and Julian’s were in the back corner). I could see the monitors that the directors/producers were watching on. Once on the monitor, I could see Sophia goofing off, making faces right into the camera. Cute. There was always music blaring between takes, probably to keep the energy up.

About 1:30 we were all driven in the vans to lunch (oh, got to walk through the front of COB, the actual “store,” which was cool) two blocks away, in a Hilton conference room. Before we even walked in I could hear Sophia’s throaty voice. She was at a corner table, sitting next to Lisa Goldsomething (Millie). As I was getting my food at the buffet I heard Sophia say something about her and Austin (Julian, her on and off-screen boyfriend) having watched Ghostbusters the night before. I sat down and tried not to stare at their table (she was still wearing her black and gray) but it was hard not to. She’s very loud—her voice carries—and seemed to draw all the attention in the room.

About three, another dozen extras who’d be playing doctors and nurses in the next two scenes invaded our hot folding-chair room. About four, we were all white-vanned over to Cape Fear Community College to film two hospital scenes. This time our holding room was a large lecture classroom, much nicer except the old ladies sat down next to me and drove me batshitcrazy. As I texted my friend Vickie, I DID NOT NEED TO KNOW ALL DETAILS OF ALL THREE OF YOUR DIVORCES, ANNOYING LADY! At one point, oldlady2 said, “I wish I knew how to text so I wouldn’t have to speak.” Really, lady, really?

Different people were chosen for different scenes. About 4:30, I was chosen and went to the “hospital” cafeteria where I immediately heard Sophia, then spotted James (Nathan) who was not sitting in his cloth “Nathan” chair but instead, tucked into a back corner quietly reading. Tried hard to see what book it was, but couldn’t. Sophia, who he recently dated, approached him with her IPad thingy and said, “Can I show you something?” He was polite to her but standoffish.

Then Joy (Haley) came in and the three of them set up for their scene, sitting at a cafeteria table. The conversation was about Brooke’s mom calling the cops on her, and something about Haley being pregnant (I still have not seen the last six episodes of this past season, so I’m not up on what’s going on. Going to wait to get the season 7 DVDs next month and watch the season in its entirety, some weekend with a couple bottles of wine.)

In this scene, I had to walk across the cafeteria, pretty much right behind Nathan&Haley. Of all the scenes I filmed I’d guess this is the one I could most likely be seen in. I’m carrying a turquoise purse.

Back to holding and then about an hour later, me and a goth (is that still the right term?) dude were chosen to film a scene in the “hospital” waiting room. We were sat in some chairs, goth was told to play with his IPhone and I was given a coffee cup of water to be sipping on. As they were setting up, Jackson (Jamie, the darling little kid who’s no longer blond) sat down in the chair next to me and was playing and talking to everyone.

It was six chairs, three on each side, back-to-back. Sophia sat down on the other side; we were back-to-back catty cornered. They filmed a scene where Jackson ran up to her. If this airs, you should be able to see the back of my head and maybe a little bit of my profile; I kept turning my head that way some but didn’t want to be too obvious. At one point, Joe Davolla (director) came over and very quietly—as though trying to convey the mood—suggested Sophia act more longing (something about wanting a baby).

A little more time in the holding room and then at 7, the white vans took us back to the parking garage. I so wanna do this again!

At the rate I fail at relationships, I’m thinking I may not have children.  Yes, I am 31, which makes me technically young.  However, the older I get, the quality of my sperm degrades, unlike wine and cheese.  Also, I’m not sure I would be good to a 10-year-old child while walking with a cane or in a wheelchair when playing catch or other sports.  Then again, I would not be good for any of those things now, unless bowling is involved.

If all else fails, I’ve decided to leave an account open at a sperm bank of my choice.  When I die, it will be a requirement that my literary executor or the wife of my literary executor must have my child in order to retain control of my literary estate within two years upon the reading of the will.  After the child is had, the parent must then abide by the following instructions:

Age 6 – Parent must dress up like the Tooth Fairy, wear makeup that makes them look beaten, take photos, then show said child photos of beaten Tooth Fairy to explain why she can’t come to collect the child’s baby teeth.

Age 8 – When the child asks why we don’t celebrate Easter, explain firmly, but kindly, zombies do not know love, do not know forgiveness, despite what Christianity tells us.  Also, make sure to explain the Easter Bunny’s true mission is to ensure more children have type two Diabetes.

Age 10 – Leave the space beneath the Christmas tree barren.  Serve venison at dinner to explain why.

Age 12 – On the child’s birthday, make a necklace out of the collected baby teeth and give it to them.

Age 14 – On the child’s first date, show the embarrassing baby photos.  When the date makes up an emergency and leaves, explain to the child this is how you tell if he or she is that into you when they stay.

Age 16 – When the child asks why you won’t let them drive, explain that we don’t believe in choking the atmosphere with our mistakes.  Make sure this is said in a moving vehicle and the mileage is incredibly poor.

Age 18 – Tell the child its father is not really its father, hand them this letter

Dear You,

They say children are our future.  Because I will never know you, I had to make sure you were damaged just enough to make sure you would be alright in this world.  If I could, I would say this to you in a ghostly form but I can’t so I write this to you instead.  I hope you can forgive me for all the things I asked your mom to do.  I love you.  It’s ok if you don’t love me.

Sincerely,

J. Bradley
2027 Nobel Laureate

I’ve never done a how-to-write blog post before. This is because

a)         PANKsters know how to write already; and

b)         I’m not entirely sure how to write.

But I realised that I do write in a few different genres, so I tried to think about how each one is different. Here are my conclusions.

How To Write Horror

Try to hear every word you write in Tricky’s voice.

How To Write Sci-Fi Erotica

Imagine what Mary Shelley would write after fucking Pris from Blade Runner.

How To Write Urban Fantasy

Peep in your neighbours’ windows and write what they do when they’re out of sight — it’s okay, because they are mermaid-vampire-werewolf hybrids and it is your duty to tell the world about their hidden battles.

How To Write  Fairy Tales

Imagine you have trapped a tiny person in a glass jar for several years. Tell the stories they would say to convince you to open the jar.

How To Write  Personal Essays

Pretend someone else is writing the essay, then write in such a way that if you met them you couldn’t look them in the eye. This is especially important if you’re British, due to our centuries-old romance with shame.

How To Write  PANK blog posts

Imagine what a professional, organised, wealthy writer would write. Then imagine what an opium-addled, tangle-brained, gutter hack would write. Try to do something that is simultaneously the opposite of both.

What’s your genre? How do you write it?

I worry that one day I will accidentally e-mail a potential sugar daddy my resume or a prospective employer a photo of my body dressed in fishnets, garter belt, and heels.   One of my fellow gold digger friends recommends the sites Seekingarrangement.com and Seekingmillionaire.com, free for would be Sugarbabes like us.   I create a profile boasting I am multilingual, a world traveler, and an Ivy League grad.     Who wouldn’t want to date such an irresistible Whore of Mensa?

I managed to lose three jobs last year.   The last job I had re-located for, selected an apartment in close proximity to work, and surrendered 2 months security deposit to management vultures.   I naively budgeted my life with the anticipation of a 60K salary (after taxes more like 37K) being direct deposited into my account every other week.   I signed a contract for a 1 year membership at a health club with orchids in the locker-room the same week they canned my ass.

So I join the rest of America by filing for weekly unemployment benefits and mass e-mailing resumes and cover letters.    Maybe because this is round three, my life feels like some warped recession carnival, playing that impossible game where you waste money to throw little plastic ping pong balls at bowls of goldfish.   Eventually one has to land so I can claim a prize that will only die in a matter of days.

Via my Sugarbabe account, I hear from guys like HinduHot4U, PonziSchemer, and WealthyMan9547, a hedge fund manager who is seeking, “A woman who if not a supermodel, is as hot as one, and is open to life changing experiences, mind blowing sex.   She understands our relationship will slowly devolve into an emotionally devastating, unstable affair devoid of true intimacy… content that as we continue down our route of mutual emotional destruction, our sex will get angrier and better in some sort of bizarre love/hate dynamic until one or both of us reach the point at which we finally implode, preferably without the destruction of any of my personal property.   Should that occur– well let’s just say I am friendly with many judges who will happily sentence you to a women’s penitentiary.”

Since I’m not looking to do any time I take a pass on that Daddy.   I have been corresponding with another who claims, “I have the ability and willingness to spoil you and I think we could have a great time together.” Loubotins and Missoni dance in my head so when he invites me out to lunch, I accept.   He says I can choose the restaurant; food is of no importance to him.   I’ve been contemplating applying for food stamps hence am in no position to turn down free food.   Despite his claiming a net worth of one million I forgo requesting 11 Madison Park or the Four Seasons, opting instead for a Cuban place I like on the UWS.

I arrive before him and am seated at the bar stirring some azucar into my cafe con leche when an unmistakably Hasidic man approaches.

“Are you Summer?”

I do a double take.   He has a thick, dark beard and mustache which covers most of his face and he is shorter than I am.   He can’t be any taller than 5’2” and is extremely round.   A large black hat covers his head and the curls Google was kind enough to inform me are called “payos” dangle over his ears.   I, who never has had much luck with a curling iron wonder how Hasids style their payos?   Do they leave curlers in overnight and is there some special hairspray they use to keep their buoyancy?   I want to ask if this is part of a daily hygiene routine?

I am also curious about the hats they don and later discover a website, which claims to be “The internet’s only clothing catalog for Hasidic Jews.”   According to them, “Modesty is our strong suit” and, “You will never be noticed by onlookers or passers-by but only by the ever watchful eye of G-D.”   They offer several varieties of black hats, including the Shvartze nipple, The Chosen One, Fear of a Black hat, and even The Pimp ranging from $47 to $450.   Their coats also have entertaining names including Saturday Night Fever, The Fiddler, and Backdoor Man and are priced at $450 each.

This “Chosen One” has asked again if I am, “Summer”?

I consider telling him he has mistaken me for Spring and making a run for it but instead stammer, “But you’re Hasidic.”

He nods, “I am.”   He leans in to whisper in my ear.   “Does that turn you on?”

My eyes widen and I shake my head.   “No!”

“You’ve never fantasized about getting with a Hasidic guy?   You are Jewish?” he asks.

I bite my tongue before I can proclaim myself a Jehovah’s Witness.   “I’m Jewish,” I say, “Reform but I haven’t been in a synagogue in years.  I had a batmitzvah, though.”   I decide not to ask if he’s interested in hearing my Torah Portion since I can’t remember anything beyond my 12 year old embarrassment that it had had to be sung.

I can barely believe any of this is happening and I know there is no way I am going to hook up with this guy.   My mind flashes back to my 10 day trip to Israel with the Birthright organization.   I have the worst luck and ended up being grouped with a bunch of Orthodox Jews.   I was in complete culture shock and it was hardly sleeping on a Kibbutz, climbing Masai, or “swimming” in the dead sea that I found so startling.   For me it had been the endless days surrounded by the young Orthodox men and women for theirs is world which demands girls marry young and be virgins on their wedding night.   Not utilize reproductive rights or family planning and have endless children- mouths they can’t feed and bodies they cannot clothe.   As if that weren’t bad enough there was the female dress- long skirts worn with sneakers and the expectation that Hasidic women shave their heads and wear wigs.   It’s beyond my understanding.

I think about making up an excuse but I want my free lunch and I figure this will be amusing if nothing else.   We get a table and I peruse the menu of beans, rice, and platanos settling on a shrimp and avocado salad.   It occurs to me why The Chosen One had not cared where we went.

“Oh!   You can’t eat shellfish!   Or use silverware or plates at restaurants!”

He confirms this, taking a sip from a bottle of Poland Springs he has brought with him.   I think about being culturally sensitive but when the waiter comes I decide fuck it, I’m having me some shrimp.   The Chosen One doesn’t seem particularly perturbed by my choice.   He is too busy giving me one of those I want to rip your clothes off looks I know all too well from men.   In my experience they’re pretty cross-cultural.

I find it interesting that it’s a sin for them to eat pork or shellfish or use electronics on the Sabbath but prostitutes are fair game even for married Fiddlers.

My food arrives and I am really excited for the avocado and shrimp.   I pierce a shrimp with my fork and chew it slowly.   It is delicious.

“So you’ve never been with a man like me?” The Chosen One is determined to ruin my meal.

I shake my head.   “I think you’d really enjoy it,” he says.   “I have a very special cock.   Very clean, very kosher.”

I’m thinking how I would love to order the platanos but I can’t sit here and listen to this big, hairy Hasid talk about his penis much longer.

“I bet you have a very beautiful body.   Can I take a better look at it?” he asks.

I shrug.   I’m wearing a blazer over a white button down blouse.   It occurs to me if I take the blazer off I will without a doubt spill food on my blouse.   I compromise by taking it off for a minute then putting it back on.

I”â„¢m still thinking how I can turn this situation around to my advantage so I tell him about the lingerie boutique on the corner I had perused earlier.   “You know, they have such gorgeous lingerie,” I tell him, “We should totally go in! You could get me something sexy.”

“Will I get to see you in it?” he asks.

“Of course!   They have dressing rooms.   You can watch me try something on then   buy it for me.   It will be super hot!”

The only person inside is the demure, Asian woman running the store.   I can only imagine what she is thinking seeing me return with the Chosen One.   I show him what I like- Cosabella and La Perla panties and bras, lovely, lacey Hankey Pankey pieces.   I am hoping for a matching set.   Chosen One doesn’t appear to be in a generous mood, though.   He points to a black thong and tells me to pick out my size.   I”â„¢m pretty annoyed.   Does he seriously need to live up to the Jewish stereotype of being a miser?

Even still I figure one thong is better than no thong so grab a small, and head towards the dressing room.   Chosen One attempts to follow but the store keeper stops him.

“Women only,” she says firmly.   Chosen One is not happy and appears miffed, like a little kid denied dessert, when he pays for the thong.

I have an interview uptown and The Chosen One offers to drive me.   I am running late and feeling too impoverished to take a cab so I allow him to play chauffer with his SUV.

As he pulls away from the curb and onto Amsterdam, he resumes talking about his, “Special, kosher cock.”   He asks, “Don’t you want to see it?”

“It’s not like I haven’t seen a circumcised penis before.”   I don’t bother keeping the boredom out of my voice.

With his left hand on the wheel, Chosen One takes his right hand and unzips his black, wool pants.   He pulls out his kosher friend.   I am almost expecting it to have a label on it- Parve: Kosher for Passover.

“What do you think?” he asks.

“That you need to focus on driving,” I say.

“Go on and touch it.   Don’t be afraid.”

“I’m not afraid,” I say dryly.   It’s not fear I feel but annoyance.   His penis is hardly intimidating; in fact the thing is downright flaccid.   We’re stopped at a red light and I just want this to be over with.   Harlem and a job interview working with octogenarians can’t get here quickly enough.   The real world of non-profits with their endless red tape, bureaucracy, and budget cuts is starting to look pretty good next to him.

“C’mon honey, give him a little kiss.   He really likes you.”   The Chosen One is trying to coax me into giving him road head.   That is so not happening.   I need to set the record straight.

“Dude, you bought me an $8 salad, a $2 coffee, and a $25 thong.   You’re lucky if I take my earmuffs off for that.”

“So how much is this going to cost me?   $50?” he suggests to the girl with $80,000 in student loans.   What was this cheapskate doing on Seeking Millionaire is beyond me.

“Look this doesn’t feel right,” I decide to lie, “I can’t be with a man of your religious background.   I’d be too afraid I’d go to hell.   But it was nice meeting you and good luck with everything.   Shalom.”   We’re almost there so I open the car door and step out into the street.   I will never meet another guy without seeing his photo first.

C. Cohen is a writer on the Eastern seaboard.

Dear Fellow First Time Authors On A Small Press,

Like you, I have a day job that supports my writing habit.  Like some of you, I also have a spouse who would taser you at the thought of you being away from them for an extended period of time.  Once you become an author on a small press, you must pimp the book and yet, you’ll have those days where the book pimps you and you’ve got the wire hanger marks to prove it.  You’ll watch  Glengarry Glen Ross fifteen times and still not glean the in-person marketing skills needed to earn your cup of coffee.  You’ll have to appear.  In public.  And talk.  To people.  You will have to read your words aloud.  You will most likely be your own agent and publicist. You’ll get really good at recognizing the following signs that indicate your gig is doomed:

1. When an organizer doesn’t release the names of the readers at an event until four days before the event takes place.

2. When an organizer doesn’t try corralling people at said event to come see you read when it’s your time to perform.

3. People molest copies of your books, smile when they read the contents of said book, and yet don’t buy a copy.  Your copies then require counseling and they are not famous enough to be on one of Dr. Drew’s rehab shows.

4. When the venue warns you it’s a bad idea to do a reading at 11 pm on a Saturday and you try any way.

5. When an organizer is pleasantly surprised a handful of people show up at your event despite a football game.

6. When the SWAT team shows up at a crime scene near the venue you are supposed to perform in and they block the street that easily accesses the venue.

7. When your name is J. Bradley.

There is hope.  All your tour expenses are tax deductible as long as you make  $250 during the tour.  You will meet new people and if you are single or amoral, you may get to meet these new people sans clothing.  You will improve your alcohol tolerance.  You may also pick up new and interesting diseases.

Congratulations on your impending failures.  May all of them be spectacular.

Love,

J. Bradley

Play Bejewelled while listening to podcasts about writing.

Make lists: To Do lists, lists of stories to finish, lists of things I want to write essays about, lists of books I want to review, lists of words that inspire me, lists of character names, lists of titles.

Make a list of all the different lists I have made.

Request books from the online library catalogue ten at a time, more than I have time to read, especially as I already have approximately 200 books I haven’t read, then never bother to actually go and pick them up, and avoid all voicemails and postcards informing me that my book has arrived, then wait for the books to be sent back, only to go and reserve them again with no intention of picking them up.

Read my Amazon Recommended For You list and carefully tick ‘not interested’ or ‘I already own this’ in order to make the suggestions ever more accurate. Then request the ones I want to read from the online library catalogue ten at a time… and so on.

Add books to my Amazon wishlist until it contains more books than I could ever read in a lifetime even if I didn’t sleep or eat or write or go to work or speak to anyone.

Move books from my bookshelves to the pile beside the bed called Books I Am Currently Reading. Flip through the first few pages. Read the author bio. Put the book on my knees when I’m lying in bed wondering what to read. Then put the book back down, where it stays until it’s obscured by the next book I take off the shelf, only to be shelved again when I do my monthly clean-up of books I have left beside the bed.

Take an hour-long bus ride to the other side of town to return a book to the university library, walk up a steep hill, post the book through the book-return slot, then stand stupidly for a moment in front of the building. Consider going for a coffee, not because I want one but because I feel stupid travelling a two hour round-trip just to post a book in a slot. Walk back down the hill and take an hour-long bus ride back home. (I kid myself that this is writerly because I always feel very inspired by listening to music and watching the city pass by the bus windows; I rarely remember to take a pen and notebook and have a terrible memory, so the inspiration is ultimately fruitless).

Write long and rambling lists of my favourite procrastination methods and post them on the PANK blog.

Every day I go to work on the bus with the other sleepers, workers whose days begin early, whose commutes are long. We sleep when we can. Some people complain about their working conditions. Some swear never to return to their offices again. But the next day we are up together before the sun. Look, there, even the bank executive sleeps in the back of his car while his driver faces down Lagos for him, like our driver who faces Lagos for us. For family. For nation. For love. For love, we are up for work before the sun.

And as often, home after it sets. At 4:30 in the afternoon I quickly shut down my workstation, gather my belongings, hurry down the stairs from my third floor office, and rush into the evening traffic on Idowu Taylor. At the Engineering bus stop the waiting crowd is eager to board the next available bus. If I don’t catch a bus by 4:40, it’s best to try IGI where I am likely to get a bus without struggling so bitterly. But today I am lucky; I get a spot at 4:37.

Maneuvering through the afternoon traffic, the driver takes a right turn, then a left, crosses the bridge at Muri Okunola Park, and takes the bus onto Awolowo Road. I am not comfortable with confinement. Neither am I patient. There is music on the stereo. The colors of the old bus — green on the bottom half, white on the top — continue to fade. Exhaust soot in every nook and cranny. Then I see her in front of me.

In front of me is a young woman, dark, in a made-in-Naija, Chelsea FC jersey. She is armed with a round wooden plank on which she has undoubtedly sold bread all day on the streets of Lagos. She has done this despite crackdowns on street vending. The bread seller is tired. She sleeps. Her head gyrates, springs sideways, back and forth, her neck elastic as an old spring. I am scared to the teeth that her neck will break, that her head will snap off and roll onto the floor. Occasionally, she shakes her head profusely like a fainting fowl, like the  kameti Salah rams who butt heads and must retreat to shake off the pressure and clear their addled heads. Then she succumbs again to the demands of her day. And tomorrow? Tomorrow, like all of us, she will do it again.

Gbenga Awomodu is a freelance writer and editor based in Lagos, Nigeria.

I always thought I was an unambitious person. I didn’t care about building a career or making lots of money or having a big house or my own office. I didn’t care about impressing anyone or causing jealousy or getting a pat on the head. I never worried about what I was going to say at high school reunions.

I went to university not to get a decent job, but just because I wasn’t sure what else to do. As of 2008, university degrees in Scotland are free; when I started, it cost £3,700 (about US$5,700) in total for a 4-year degree, and I figured that was worth not having to get a job for a few more years. My only ambitions in life were to be happy, read lots of books, and stay up late. But then I started writing.

Like most writers, I had always written: childhood fantasies, angsty teenage poems, journals full of scrawl. It was dreadful, of course; but I loved it. At 22, I finished my undergraduate degree and then took a year off to travel and work in a bookshop and stay in bed for a month after having my tonsils out. After a drunken suggestion one night, I applied to a Creative Writing Masters course. It was only after I got accepted that I realised I was going to have to start taking my writing a bit more seriously.

At first, it was still just a bit of fun. I’d always enjoyed writing stories, and was glad that I could now spend a few years stringing words together rather than having to do anything difficult or boring with my days. I must have taken it seriously at some point as I got good grades and ended up with a Distinction, but it just felt like fun at the time. Playing around with prose sestinas, cobbling together screenplays for my filmmaker brother, writing a new NaNoWriMo novel every year — surely they weren’t going to give me letters after my name for this. It wasn’t work. I could do this shit forever, if only some sucker would pay me.

By my second year it was still fun, but it wasn’t just fun. Maybe I couldn’t be the best writer in the room, but I wanted to be one of the best. I didn’t want to just turn up to class; I wanted to be noticed. It wasn’t only about class, either: I started to think about how my writing would fit into the literary world rather than just how it would fit into the pages of my notebook. Not only did I take opportunities that came my way, I started looking out for new ones. I was still finding it hard to imagine people reading my writing outside my critique group, but I was considering the possibility. I accepted I was going to have to look further than the tips of my own shoes.

It’s really only now, a year after graduating, that I really feel my ambition whipping its tail. My girlfriend gets up at 7am for work, so that’s when I get up too. I’m at my laptop with a cup of coffee, knee-deep in emails, before she’s even put on her socks. I skip meals because I’m too busy writing. I think about writing just before I fall asleep and just after I wake up. I cancel on friends, forget to call my mother, court repetitive strain injuries; all to write.

If I put this sort of time and effort into a ‘proper’ job, I’d be at the top of the corporate ladder by now. There would be twelve photos of my face, lined up along the wall, labeled Employee of the Month. But I do all this for writing, and none of it feels like work.

It’s not all fun either. Sometimes I don’t feel like it. Sometimes I have to force myself to sit at my laptop. Sometimes I have to bribe myself with a fancy lunch or an early night or an extra-large mocha if I can just finish another page. So then, I ask myself, why do it?

I don’t have a boss leaning over my shoulder, making sure I don’t watch chat shows instead of writing. I don’t have a job description or a set of goals I must meet. Whether I write or not, I’ll still get paid the same — ie. nothing. It doesn’t matter to anyone whether I write 6,000 words a day or 6,000 words a year. No-one really cares except me. So again, why do I do it? Not because I always like it. Not because it’s always fulfilling. Not for the money or glamour or screaming fans or world tours or sexy girls throwing themselves at my feet — if these things are consequences of writing, I’ve yet to experience them. So why bother?

Because the ambition I thought I didn’t have has finally got its sharp little teeth into something, and it’s not letting go.