I’m writing a book. I know a lot of Bloggers make this announcement and then write some crappy tome about how being a teenager with acne and a penchant for emo poems was wretched and delicious; but they were special and insightful. The world just didn’t understand! The difference between my book and everyone else’s is that I had a wonderful childhood. Sure, I had no friends and I didn’t do anything interesting but I was happy. The other difference is that I have an expert in publishing guiding me through the process and she’s not letting me take the missteps that cause you to tread down the wrong path. Oh, there is also the small issue of being a published author before the Internet was publicly available.
The most fulfilling part of writing a book has been people’s response to my endeavor. No, people aren’t proud of me and I haven’t experienced an outpouring of support for my work. People’s reactions have been pretty universal, not to mention: swift, sudden, and severe. People are terrified. I haven’t seen this amount of mass hysteria since the Cuban Missile Crisis.
The people fall into two camps. There is a very large contingent of people who fear that I am going to “Sedaris” them. They know that I have been collecting stories and foibles for years. They are treasured up in my heart and at any time I could loose them on the world in all their absurdity, hilarity, and bitterness. Chaos Bean raises the twin issues of the idea that I could be sued and that people are stupid enough to go into open court and announce that, “the jerk in the story, yeah that’s me.” If I decided to write this book it could also create a firestorm of defamation in kind, or considering the literacy of the people I have the best stories on defecation in kind. I have not told these people that the book isn’t about them because it’s just too damn fun to watch them quake in their boots. Nedenia and Alex Vance would be set for life if I wrote that book because they’d spend the rest of their careers in expensive litigation.
The other camp that people who are terrified are people who think I am going to write a Tucker Max story about them. First, I am flattered that they think I am that clever but I am alternately terrified that they think I am going to write a story about vulgar, tawdry sex with them. I don’t know what Spritopias you’ve been partying with or which one they’ve hung around but this Spritopias hasn’t even had boring sex with anyone, no sex for me at all. I have no idea how I would write a Tucker Max story about anyone. What would I say? I have no idea how to even fake that. I’m not that good at telling a convincing story.
Actually, my book is a theological work and isn’t really a work of fiction to skewer the people in my life. I’m writing about the most important thing I ever learned in Sunday school, Lutheran University, and as a teacher. The book will be about Forgiveness and throwing someone under a bus isn’t the best way to teach that.
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