From One Amateur Writer to Another

gurney, coup, lover, cherry cola     -shirley               

Just for the sake of imagination, let us assume it’s a Tuesday afternoon, the kind that has the sun glinting from behind that dusty couch in your childhood home. We’re sitting in some French-esque coffee shop, only we’re too nonconformist to order americanos—or, actually, anything ending in “-o.” Instead, it’s a lemonade for the lady and a cherry cola for the gentleman. You can decide which of us is what. If you like, we could even be lovers. The choice is yours. Just make sure there’s some tension, okay? Some compelling backstory. Try to spice things up a little.

The temperature is marvelously comfortable (if but slightly humid), but no one cares about the weather nowadays. That kind of symbolism is boring. Just kidding. Every detail matters. And if there’s one thing you remember, it’s to never start anything off with “‘Twas was a dark and stormy night.” That, my friend, is an amateur move. Listen, it’s all about metafiction and the aesthetic quality of things. Does it or does it not evoke emotion? What is the bodily function of the text, whatever that means? So anyway, we’re conversing about Bilbo Baggins, and whether or not one should prefer curly fries over straight-cut ones, and the incredible idiots who still believe the world is round. Even after the news.

The news being: Peter Wilkins proved the opposite yesterday by rowing a boat west of Hawaii and falling into eternity, you say. And I nod and I’m thinking to myself, “Crikey, this is like Kafka.” But of course, I’m thinking this outside of the text—because remember, we’re doing this for the sake of imagination. Anyways, I’m thinking, “Crikey, this really is Kafka. The man is just going about his life when suddenly, he turns into an insect. When suddenly, the world is flat.” But of course, I don’t say this; I’m in character. And messages must always be somewhat hidden and left up to the discretion of the reader. Otherwise—well, otherwise, people wouldn’t want to major in English, would they? What a wretched world that would be. So I choose my words very carefully and say: “blah blah blah backspace backspace blah blah backspace.” Right—I have to warn you. In this business, there is a whole lot of backspacing. 

+++

Peter Wilkins is your father. Okay, not really. But essentially, he is. They’re both wise, quirky, and wildly adored. About a month ago, your father slipped on a tangerine peel and ended up being carried into the ER on a gurney. In some random shuffle of luck, one thing led to another, and this Peter Wilkins, who instead slipped off the edge of the world, was born in your mind. My friend, remember: to be a writer is to feel too intensely, to think too much too often, and to have every person you meet—whether real or not—end up in your writing. This includes yourself. It’s through your memory that these people change and through your imagination that they’re recycled into someone else. Horribly vulnerable business, writing is. Be careful if you break a writer’s heart. 

At any rate, the important thing is that you were inspired, by your father and his (un)fortunate accident with a tangerine peel, to write a story. The thing is, at some point, your entire plan will probably be sabotaged by your characters, who form a dysfunctional CIA coup overthrowing you. And when that happens, our innocent little Peter Wilkins ends up being the man who murdered the waitress in the bar across this cafe, and this news about rowing into eternity was, unbeknownst to us, a mysterious clue of sorts. You write page after page after page, until you reach something called “The End,” which is a joke in itself because the definition of imagination is that there is never an end to anything. 

Alright, I think that should be about it. I know I might’ve gone a little fast, but does this make any sense to you? 

I am sitting, my iced fill-in-the-blank in hand, patiently waiting for your answer. Just as I am about to take a sip of only-you-know-what, you suck in your breath and then let it out—very, very slowly. You murmur something about having one remaining query. Well, go right on ahead then.

“Why did my father slip on a tangerine peel and not a puddle of water or a half-eaten banana?”

Oh. Hm. 

Pause. The intentional slowing down of time through syntax. A bucketload of chirping crickets, too, even though it’s 2 in the afternoon.

You know, that’s an awfully good question. My best guess is that it’s probably for the aesthetic quality of things.