Have You Written Anything Lately?

I tell people I’m a writer.

You know, when they ask what I do.

“What do you do?”

“Oh. I’m a writer,” I tell them. “I got my Master’s degree in Journalism at Boston University and I just graduated.”

Are you impressed?

Yeah, you usually are.

“Well. So. Have you written anything lately?”

Fuck.

I hate that question. And I always know it’s coming, too.

I hate that question because the truth is, I haven’t written anything in months.

Actually, the last time I bared my soul to all of you, I was in Bangkok, writing from the 7th floor outdoor patio of some hipster eatery where I ordered venison eggs benedict and vanilla bean passion fruit juice that I couldn’t afford.

Yeah, on the last day of my three month travels throughout Southeast Asia I wrote this open letter to my brother and travel companion, Sam. Remember?

It was Sunday, March 22, 2015 and there I was, in Thailand, staring out at this crowded, humid, buzzing Bangkok landscape between forking bites of a spicy arugula side salad at this ultra cool Bangkok cafe and good god damn was I feeling nostalgic.

Remember that pho we ate in Phu Quoc, Sam? How it was spicy and salty and how that pink beef disintegrated on our tongues like pink cotton candy?

Or how about that honey toast we ate in Bangkok, huh? Drizzled with syrup and dusted with calories?

Remember when a monkey tried to steal money from out of my purse in Bali, Sam? God, we hated that place… didn’t we Sam?

You know, the standard kind of regrets and realizations that inevitably come at the end of any vacation.

…I wish I had seen that…

…If only I had done this…

…Why didn’t I go there?

The writer in me told me that there was a story there. Some brilliant and novel conclusion to be drawn from this tangled string of realizations.

So, I wrote them all down in this letter to my brother.

But it wasn’t just a letter. It was all… writerly, you know?

I told my audience this emotional story where this lost girl travels half-way around the world with her estranged younger brother and, like, really discovers herself.

I made these humbling admissions and reluctant confessions and drew wise conclusions.

I sincerely apologized and wrote witty one-liners and these succulent descriptions of Cambodian pork and Vietnamese wind.

And people loved it.

I loved it.

Because it was excruciatingly candid and kinda poetic and totally genuine.

And, you know, I was going to get home from Asia, and I was just going to keep cranking out these pieces that people loved and that I loved because I’m a writer, or at least that’s what I tell people, and that’s what I do.

I write.

I fill these college-ruled notebooks with story ideas and scribbles of Hemingway-esque lines that sound good in my head. I sit down in front of my chunky, white MacBook in some pretentious coffee shop that sells unreasonably priced cayenne ginger ales and rosewater macaroons and no whip mochas and I type into a word document titles of chapters and character descriptions and pages of dialogue. My hope is that my works read like I just sat down at my regular table at my regular coffee shop with my chunky, white MacBook and my regular coconut milk latte and just spewed onto the page these fantastic paragraphs about chicken wings in Kuala Lumpur and translucent water in Thailand.

But really, it’s a lot harder than that.

I type a sentence – a frustrating stringing together of letters and proper punctuation.

I delete it.

I type another sentence – an exhausting crafting of syllables and quotation marks.

I delete it, again.

I stare blankly at my blinking cursor.

Blink. Blink. Blink. Blink. Blink. Blink. Blink.

It takes me days to write a piece. Weeks sometimes.

It’s a tedious job. And it’s self-conscious work.

But I do it because it’s also a profession of authority.

As a writer, I’m not just expected to have an expert understanding of proper punctuation and parts of speech and grammar rules, but also, to have some wise and novel hypothesis about the world. To be able to translate these enlightened ideas into this digestible text for my peers. It’s my job to tell you secrets and teach you lessons.

And, you know, I get off on having the information. On knowing the answers.

In Asia, I had all the answers.

Happiness was over-sweetened Thai Iced Tea.

Unbearable discomfort was skull fragments getting stuck in your sandals at the killing fields in Phnom Penh.

True love was chocolatey, fragrant blooms at Singapore’s National Orchid Garden.

I know. I was there.

Well, until I wasn’t, because then it was time to come home.

But it was o.k. because I was going to come back the United States and I was going to be interesting, you know? I was going to be this wild girl with all these profound stories to tell and people were going to be envious of me and my travels and I was going to get off on having all the answers because I’m a writer and that’s what I do.

There was that profile I had wanted to write about my new friend named Golf that I had met in Pai, Thailand. He was this cowboy-boot-wearing owner of Your Resort who had lived in 29 countries in his life and who now drove 15 miles outside of town, daily, only to drink the finest espresso. He rolled sushi and tobacco cigarettes and spoke French and rode a fast, black motorcycle without a helmet. And it was going to be this whole piece, you know, about these unexpectedly wonderful people that help you find all the answers in these unexpectedly wonderful places.

And I was going to write this story about this ridiculous sex-capade I had in Ho Chi Minh City. Yeah, some candid confession about how I had fucked this hot, Swedish stranger in the tiny, filthy bedroom of some strange Vietnamese apartment building that he drove me to on the back of his motorcycle while my brother impatiently waited for me back at the hostel. You know, these sweaty and slippery descriptions of this dangerous sex that was all hair pulling and ear biting and OH BABY DO IT HARDER’s.

Yeah. I was gonna write that.

And people were going to love it because it was shocking and my parents were going to wince in discomfort and I was going to love it.

But then I got back to Santa Barbara, where I stayed for a month before returning to Boston, and I just didn’t write it.

I didn’t write a single word even though I’m a writer and that’s what I do. I write.

There was no frustrating stringing together of letters and proper punctuation.

There was no exhausting crafting of syllables and quotation marks.

There was no empty staring at an expectant blinking cursor.

And I don’t know why, but I just couldn’t write it.

Oh, I had all kinds of excuses. But none of them were the real reason that I wasn’t writing.

Like, it’s because I was busy, you know?

Yeah. Busy.

Busy sleeping with this guy who’s cocaine snorting and whiskey and wine drinking got me stuck in this dizzying routine of sweaty late nights and orgasm-groggy mornings that just didn’t leave much time for opening new word documents.

Yeah, I was busy picking up hostess shifts at this old restaurant that I used to work at so that I could afford to smoke joints and smoke bowls and smoke bong loads and smoke blunts.

Busy beach walking.

Busy eating tacos.

Busy making excuses for not writing.

I’m still on vacation.

I’ll write it later.

I’m enjoying every moment, dammit.

But it was o.k. I was going to get back to Boston, you know, and back to my routine and back to paying rent and I was going to write, you guys, because I’m a writer and that’s what I do.

I write.

And then I got to Boston and vacation was really over and I got a job serving tables at an Irish pub in Cambridge and just couldn’t write.

And all the time people were asking me, “What do you do?”

“Oh. I’m a writer,” I told them. “I just got my Masters degree in Journalism at BU.”

“Wow! Great! Have you written anything lately?”

Fuck.

“Well, I’m kinda working on something…” I would lie.

“Oh really? What’s it about?”

FUCK!

What was it about? Nothing!

OK?!

The truth is that I wasn’t writing anything, ok?!

The truth is that I was just telling people I was a writer. Because I got home from Asia and I got home from Santa Barbara and I got back to Boston and I was using my Masters degree to serve tables, and, god damn, I didn’t have any of the answers.

How disappointing, right? A Journalism Master serving tables?

Yeah. I know.

And I really hate to disappoint you, you know.

But, it’s like, I got home from this fantasy trip and I had laundry to fold and the cable bill was due and Lars needed cat food and I was coming down from this travel high that I was riding in Asia and writing that story about the saxophone player that lived next door wasn’t paying my rent.

Serving tables was paying my rent.

It’s not that I didn’t want to write that story about the saxophone player that lived next door, because I did. I really did.

I really wanted to tell you about how these thick, rosy saxophone notes would float through the sticky, New England summer air and linger in my room like cigarette smoke. I was going to be all romantic and nostalgic and I was going to use words like “creamy” and “darling” and reading it was going to make you feel like you were sitting in a Renoir painting.

But I was busy.

And I don’t just mean busy like I was busy in Santa Barbara with, like, noon-time blow jobs and dabs torches.

I mean busy like working doubles and hosting perpetual house guests busy. And I was attending weddings in Napa and applying to writing jobs and trying to figure out where in the world I was going to move when my apartment lease was up at the end of August.

And it was this “What’s next?” question, you know, that was really freaking me out because I didn’t know any of the answers.

Where in the world am I moving when my lease is up next month?

What do I want to do with this degree I have?

What the actual fuck am I doing?

WHAT DO I WANT?

I don’t know.

I don’t know.

I don’t know.

So I thought about it real hard.

For weeks.

I thought of all these places that I could move to and all these moments that I could have and all these different people I could be.

For a couple of hours I was thinking that I should just move to, like, Santa Fe. Or Albuquerque. And I could paint my hair silver and wear turquoise and fire pottery. I could sleep with a poncho and have this real Lady of the Canyon moment. I could write about bright stars and rattlesnake sounds and cactus fruit.

And then a couple of hours later I was thinking that I should move back to California. To Los Angeles. I could live by the beach and wrap Christmas lights around a palm tree during the holidays. I could, like, stop eating and apply to work at Buzzfeed, and on the weekends I could drive to Santa Barbara and not tell my parents. I could write about snorting blow and having sex and weekend road trips to Las Vegas.

But that idea seemed so… cliché. So… Californication.

So then I thought, maybe I’ll go to Seattle.

I could, like, wear flannel legitimately and pierce my septum. I could drink coffee pretentiously and listen to Fiona Apple with real angst. I could date a guy that, like, has tattoos and has an ax and likes maple syrup. And I could use the rainy weather as an excuse to really just hibernate and write.

Yeah, yeah. Seattle.

I could never shake Seattle.

What about Miami…

…But Seattle…

Or how about Austin?

…Seattle.

So. I did it.

I decided on Seattle and I moved here six days ago.

Yeah. I packed up my things and I told everyone I was going to Seattle to be a writer.

And I meant it, you know.

I was going to get here and find a regular coffee shop where I could sit in front of my chunky, white Mac book, with my regular coconut milk latte and spew onto the page these fantastic paragraphs about garlicky steamed clams and fluffy evergreen trees.

And I will, you guys, because I’m a writer and that’s what I do.

I swear… I’ll write…

But first, let me just unpack these boxes.