Newsletter from Jay Wilcox - March 2024: On Heroism

"You must stay drunk on writing so reality cannot destroy you."

- Ray Bradbury

Good morning/afternoon/evening,

Ten years ago, I wrote to keep myself alive--a survival predicated on production, tallying pages at the end of each day. If I didn't write enough, then I was worthless. Life was worthless. I'm not describing a healthy young man here. No, this was someone in the throes of a coping mechanism, resentful of both his past and future. This way of thinking--of compressing myself down to a single quantifiable task as a means of weathering depression--had carried me through the loneliness of school and the uncertainty that followed graduation.

Forcing my life into a narrative helped me endure it. After all, if the title of my life's movie would be Young Writer Writes His Way to Enormous Publishing Success, then it didn't matter what the life around that narrative looked or felt like. If I lived in a story, I could be the hero.

So what changed?

Did anything change, or do I still in some way view my life as a movie, distracting myself from deeper questions of mortality and meaning? After all, do I not still get antsy whenever bedtime approaches and I haven't gotten any writing done?

I've heard it said that one's best quality is also often their worst, their greatest strength proving a double-edged sword--and when I think back to how much I prized SHEER, INDOMITABLE DISCIPLINE, I think of how that discipline became blinders. I didn't invest in relationships. Small talk irritated me. As long as I was writing every damn day, I could outsmart my life, writing my way above and beyond and outside of my own feeble humanity.

I still want to be heroic.

I don't know if that part of the narrative will ever die--that impulse to hold some small part of the world and change it.

Right now, my daughter's sleeping in her bassinet at my feet. Talk about feeble humanity! This girl is learning to lift her head, and I love her so much for her efforts--for everything down to her sneezes and the way she stares at me, bringing me into focus. She brings my whole life into focus. I used to wonder how having children would change me--how it might hurt my creativity--but in this moment I feel more clarity than transformation. She's the main character. I can still be her hero. My long, rambling stories put her to sleep, and when I hold her, when I gently, rhythmically rap my fingers on her back to help her nod off, I think of all the stories we'll write together.

I sincerely hope you've been well. As always, you're welcome to write back.

Infinite Regards,

Jay