The Autumn Writer
No, you’re not wrong—that title definitely seems off. We’re only a few weeks into spring, after all. I blame Bob Seger. Well, perhaps it’s more accurate to blame XM Radio’s 70s soft rock channel, The Bridge.
Regarding Seger, I was never the biggest fan of my fellow Michigander. Heck, until recently I was never any sort of fan of 70s soft rock. There’s a certain irony to my discovery of The Bridge, and finding that the songs featured there soothe me. It might be the simple balm of nostalgia. Or maybe it’s my punishment for making it to 60, that I’m actually appreciating a type of music that I so ardently disdained as a teenager. Whatever the reason for my new musical penchant, it led me to the epiphany that inspired the above title and this essay.
I had always considered Seger hits to be better suited to selling trucks than soothing anxiety, let alone inspiring introspection. That is until recently, when the song Night Moves came on. It was Seger’s first mega-hit—the song, and album, that launched him and his Silver Bullet Band into the national spotlight. I’d only ever heard it as a simple ditty about teenage sexual exploration—and it is mostly that (with a dash of 70s misogyny, to boot). But this time, for the first time, the fond reminiscence in the lyrics caught my ear. I perked up and tuned into Seger’s voice in a completely new way. When he sang of the “sweet summertime, summertime,” I understood it anew, as a phase of life. Then he mentions feeling the lightning, and I grasped how, when we’re young, things tend to strike us, electrify us—and not just sex. I felt the phrase: “waiting on the thunder” in a whole new way. When we’re struck like that, we long for it to resonate in our lives.
Then came the famous, almost-spoken bridge:
“I woke last night to the sound of thunder
How far off I sat and wondered?
Started hummin’ a song from 1962
Ain’t it funny how the night moves?
When you just don’t seem to have as much to lose
Strange how the night moves
With autumn closin’ in…”
And I thought, damn–yeah, ain’t it funny? I realized how the night moves for me now, how often I wake up thinking and remembering and wondering—so much more powerfully than I used to. On those nights I see it all: distant past, still so close; fleeting present; looming future.
Then and there, I perfectly saw my writing life in Seger’s lyrics—how electric the discoveries have been, how I’ve waited on the thunder; how I just don’t seem to have as much to lose. Indeed, I’ve reached a point in my life that, while humming a song from 1976, I can see just how strangely it all moves. With autumn closing in…
A Seasoned Writer
It’s not that I consider myself a novice, but even as I close in on twenty years of writing I’ve remained hesitant to claim any sort of expertise. I’ve finished a half-dozen manuscripts, but besides knowing there’s always much more to learn, I think my hesitance is born of the bottom line: “Still not published.” Even here on WU, I tread fairly cautiously. I’ve always been happy to share my experience, but who am I to assert or declare anything to my fellow writers?
My wife and I recently had dinner with one of her clients. This is someone I’ve been acquainted with for the better part of a decade, and we’ve occasionally seen each other socially over that time. Our dinner was the first time he actually had the chance to ask me about my writing. He was persistent and seemed genuinely interested, so I shared more than I typically do. At some point, after an explanation of Tolkien’s role in the origin of my story-world, he stopped me. “Let me get this straight,” he said. “You first envisioned doing this when you were eleven, you went back to it in your 40s, and now—at 60—you’re about to start publishing the damn thing? That’s remarkable.”
I hadn’t really thought of it that way. Like Seger, the client had provided me with a new perspective on my journey. Putting the two together has given me the wherewithal to declare myself a seasoned writer. It may be spring, but for what it’s worth, I am the autumn writer.
Assertions of the Newly Self-Ordained
Given my new perspective, I’m feeling newly entitled to make a few writerly assertions and declarations. Nothing too controversial, but I feel it’s time to make a start. I also still feel obligated to say that, yes, these are the mere opinions of a writer who has striven for a substantial period. Also, some of these might strike you as patently obvious, but for one reason or another, they’re tidbits for which I’ve grown or regained an appreciation. In other words, your mileage may vary.
Without further ado, here are a few springtime assertions from this autumn writer:
1—Write the books you want to read. Simple, right? I put this one at the top of the list mostly because I started out intending to do this very thing, and somewhere along the line I lost sight of it as my maxim. During the years of striving, there can be a powerful lure to make stories become what you perceive others want them to be. Resist it. Routinely remind yourself what you wanted to accomplish when you started, and keep yourself on the path toward it. You’ll thank me when autumn closes in.
2—Care less, write more. By care less, I mean about what anyone else thinks in regard to you and writing. Looking back I wish I could take most all of the hours I spent caring about what anyone thought or said or did about my work, or me as a writer, and just spent them writing. I can see now that the writing itself has always been the cure for so much of what has ailed me.
3—It truly is subjective! I’ve heard this a thousand times over the course of my journey, and oh how I wish I’d long ago found my way to really accepting it. When someone—doesn’t matter who—doesn’t like your work, or any aspect of it, all it means is that this one thing you’ve created does not match with their very subjective taste. Period.
4—Art and capitalism are the makings of a volatile and inconsistent mixture. Take it from a guy who spent twenty years in business and then almost twenty more as a creator: seeking to place monetary value on human creation is an extremely imperfect undertaking. It’s futile to imagine one without the other, and yet insisting that one should perfectly compliment or define the other is a toxic notion. Think about it—without the frenzied commercialism of Beatlemania we never would’ve gotten the artistic beauty of Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. But did the Beatles’ creative freedom ultimately lead us to the glut of 70s corporate rock? Without the success of Peter Jackson’s wonderful Lord of the Rings movies, would we have ended up with the abomination that is The Hobbit films trilogy? Examples abound. Bottom line, don’t invest an ounce of your soul in how well or poorly your creative work sells.
5—Seek feedback, but genuinely believe it’s ignorable. I heard this one a lot over the years, too. Oh how I wish there was a way to make sure every writer who hears it truly embraces it. If feedback doesn’t resonate, it’s not just a good idea to disregard it—you must jettison that shit. Get it off the boat or it’s going to start stinking. If it rots onboard, it could even make you sick, which might steer you off course. I spent way too many hours of my writing life thinking that there must be some value to dissenting critique. The opposite has been true. Yes, it can devalue your work. Worse, it can devalue your self-esteem.
6—It’s about YOU. This one makes a nice bookend to writing what you want to read. When autumn closes in, you come to appreciate that this journey is really about you—your accumulating experience, your growth, your wisdom. It’s an endless cycle, learning and growing and putting what’s gained back into the work. What comes of that externally is not for you. Worry about what you can control: the work itself. None of the rest matters.
Seasons Change and So Did I
It may be spring, but I’ve always been fond of autumn. Autumn is a time of reaping and stowing. It’s a time of settling in with what one’s gathered, which lends itself to sharing. For me, it feels natural to accept this change. I’m comfortable being the autumn writer. It really does feel like it’s time for me to share what I’ve gathered, starting with this post.
Considering that lightning first struck almost exactly fifty years ago, I find that I’m glad to have made it here, in spite of the relative lack of thunder. I’m happy that I’ll have an appreciation for the tidbits I’ve gathered when I share my books later this year. It allows me to stay focused and excited about continuing my work, to keep from being distracted by all of the non-writing necessities of publication.
Ain’t it funny?—when I do find myself sitting and wondering how far off the thunder is, I find I just don’t have as much to lose. As autumn closes in.
How about you, WU? Do you love or hate 70s soft rock? Are you okay with autumn, even this early in the spring? Care to share any of the tidbits you’ve gathered?
