Last Tuesday, I had the terrifying pleasure of reading at Castalia, a series run by the Creative Writing MFA students at the University of Washington. I haven’t read in almost four years since graduating from the MFA program and although I was mortified, I was also completely sick.
(I’ve had this cold for about 10 days now.)
So, I just about canceled the day of the reading, although I felt incredibly honored to read amongst the talented (and wildly-entertaining!) crop of students. I was also a bit terrified that I’d say something from the podium and instead of the [insert laughter here] I would get dirty looks that I couldn’t even see because of the brashness of the stage lighting.
I wouldn’t be able to see my own tormentors. I wouldn’t be able to reflexively stick my tongue out or flip them the bird.
I didn’t cancel because, hell, I figured reading in front of a group of people only happens every four years, like Leap Year, and it should mean something kinda like how an eclipse used to mean something and now it’s just a Mitsubishi model and a thing that you get special glasses to stare at.
Even though I’m not working on anything particularly out-loud-readable and short and good, I might as well share something. I had to start looking at it that way, “sharing,” instead of as an exposure of my no-goodness.
And maybe with my raspy voice and cold, the audience would have sympathy and go easy on me. They’d pull out their tomatoes and right before they’d throw them, they’d think, “gosh, I’m kinda hungry,” and imagine the lovely tomato salad they could make themselves when they got home. So, they would put the tomatoes back in their bags and I’m not covered in juice.
At the podium, the small stage lights were so intense that I began to sweat. I felt like a chicken strip under the heat lamp at the deli counter. Or better yet, the egg roll next to the chow mein beneath the greasy glass.
I wondered how many shades my tan would “deepen” during the reading.
And then the story, which I’ve never quite read aloud in front of a group people. The story with the words “turds smashed” and “diarrhea” in it. Who knew these words were so awkward until you are facing a silent room of silent people and a silent darkness and there is the heat lamp in front of you and you feel like a talking egg roll saying the word, “diarrhea.”
Words you wouldn’t use at dinner party, let alone, in front of a group of people–some friends, some people who don’t even know you except that you write stories, in this case, about lonely women and what they do to their animals.
And you want to say, “But wait! I am not that lonely woman. And that is not my animal! I do volunteer work! I’m a fiction writer; I make things up!”
But no, all that you can say is what the story says.
And realize that reading in the dark reminds you of writing, rewriting your novel.
All those lonely nights typing; you think no one is in the room but in reality you just can’t see them. It seems lonely but it isn’t; with writing the potential for someone else reading persists, and that potential sits with you in the room, quietly behind the glare.
You just don’t know it because they haven’t thrown the tomatoes yet.
They’re too busy eating.