Newsletter from Jay Wilcox - August 2019: On Cynicism and Giving the Hell Up
Good morning/afternoon/evening!
I ran track in high school, and every practice began with a timed-mile warm-up. Coach's rule:If anyone doesn't hit the day's time, the whole team runs it again after practice.
Every week, the time got faster, so that by week three or four, some finished with only a half-second to spare. Nobody wanted to have to run extra. More importantly, nobody wanted to be the one that made his teammates run extra.
"No way the freshmen are hitting this new time," the guy next to me said, as we sidled up to the starting line at the top of week five. "I don't wanna waste my energy if the freshmen are gonna drag us down anyway."
For the sake of anonymity, I will refer to this guy as Chugbert.
Coach blew the starting whistle. Sure enough, the freshmen soon fell behind. "Looks like we're running after practice," Chugbert groaned, as he began to slow down. He eased his way into the back of the pack, his strides long and lazy like slowed-down footage of some old-timey cartoon character. Chugbert knew how to look smug while running.
I hit Coach's time. Cleared it by a handful of seconds.
Chugbert, the Great Saver of Energy Himself, came in a cool thirty seconds overdue, barely breaking a sweat--right as Coach announced a change of plans: only the guys who hadn't hit the warm-up time would have to run again. If you hit the time, you could go straight home after practice.
Chugbert was understandably pissed.
I think about Chugbert a lot, when I'm feeling cynical about my writing. It's sometimes tempting to give up and cut the top off Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs--to forsake the big-picture Thing You Really Want and pursue only entertainment and distraction. To not waste energy on something that may never pay off.
My novel might come out the moment 45 dissolves the courts and declares martial law. The 2020 presidential election and all its attendant chaos may overwhelm our ability to play around with our imaginations. Do you ever feel like the game is about to get swept off the table right as you're readying your winning move? Shoot, climate change has people who would otherwise want kids opting out of the whole damn thing, heroically saving their children from a burning planet.
Should I therefore slow down and focus on more immediate pursuits--things like buying clothes and discovering new restaurants and hoarding as much money as possible? Should I budget for civilization's collapse?
Chugbert saw an immutable future. However, fortune favored the foolish, the wasters of energy. It can be extraordinarily expensive to hedge your bets--to live only half a life and plan on circling back for the other half later, once the world has settled down and the freshmen pose no threat. I know this and yet harbor incredibly negative thoughts. For example, when I picture myself approaching what Boomers refer to as "retirement age," I envision hoarding canned goods, hiding in ravines from warlords not yet born. Many millennials, indebted and unable to save a dollar, unironically claim to see no future.
Still.
Still, we keep going to work and dating and making our efforts, hustling as the coastlines creep in. We don't know which parts of the landscape will get swept away and therefore must live as if we'll still be here tomorrow--because hell, maybe tomorrow we'll still be here.
Any future depends on keeping up illusions and believing in whatever's at stake, running like the warm-up mile matters. I write and entertain the possibility that Coach might change his mind, showing mercy, as I bound, exhausted, toward the finish line.
Infinite Regards,
Jay
P.S. - As for Music for Parasites, my novel.... In the next two weeks, I'll conclude another round of edits and begin soliciting in earnest to agents. In the process of telling your friends and family about this book, let me know if you need another copy of the synopsis and/or elevator pitch. More than happy to provide!