I’ve never worked on my Birthday. The idea is inherently repellent to me. Maybe I’ve been spoiled, growing up in a family that always took vacation during the last week of August. But I’m breaking the tradition this year. Truthfully, I did a little frontloading to get this post out on a Wednesday, which happens to be my 42nd birthday.
It makes me reflect on my writing career, which could be characterized (generously) as a slow-burner. I got my first academic publication before I turned 30. At that time, I set a goal to have three times that many, and maybe a book out before I turned 40.
Not to be. I managed to get a series of academic pubs, mostly in my early 30s. Teetering toward the edge of thirtysomething, I got my first fiction break. The late John Stahle gave me a chance by publishing my retold fairytale The Vain Prince.
I could qualify things by pointing out that I’ve worked a demanding full-time job for the past 17 years. In fact, through most of my post grad life, I’ve taken part-time work on top of that. But there’s two sides to the coin. I’d love to have lots more time to write, and I think I’d be more productive and faster if I didn’t need a full-time job to sustain myself. But there’s also the wise adage: if you want a job done well, give it to someone busy.
I think about my writing in the same way that I think about my coming out at times. What if I had started younger? Think of all the amazing experiences I would have had…all the wasted years. But regret doesn’t stick with me as much these days. Things happen for a reason. It’s not a religious sentiment (perish the thought), it’s more like being practical.
Every experience I had shaped my life as a writer, and as a queer man. I could only do what I did at the time with what I had at the time. Besides, the Japanese just proved that time travel isn’t possible. No going back and switching majors in college or swaggering around campus as a self-empowered queer.
So, my goal for this decade is to write as much as I can, to build my readership, and to try not to take myself too seriously. I find that last one gets easier with age. I don’t mean not taking my writing seriously, or not setting ambitious goals. Ambitious goals are good. I mean being open to the knowledge that’s out there beyond my inner world.
Socrates put it this way: the more I learn, the less I know.
The photo isn’t my Birthday cake. It’s just a stock image I found and thought was funny. Who wouldn’t want a Chuck Norris Birthday cake?
