Art can make you feel better, even now: Part II

Offerings to reconnect with your art, when you're ready.

The morning after the election, I woke up early in a hotel room in Denver. I have a certain fondness for the blankness and predictability of hotel rooms—white sheets and towels, a little notepad to scrawl thoughts on, a sign you can hang on the door that politely says leave me alone.

As I did in 2016, I put the world off for a little while, kept my phone off, my eyes out of email and news. The thing I did, the thing I always do, was open my novel.

I picked at the edges of a scene I’ve been struggling with for a few weeks. The scene requires some research as well as balancing exposition and world building with forward action. In other words, a lot of plates to spin at once.

I’ve been working on the scene slowly, moving things around, going paragraph by paragraph, sentence by sentence, trying to clarify and connect disparate elements and drive the narrative forward. This is the part about writing that I like, and also the part about writing I dislike. On good days, this work feels full of care and attention. On bad days, it feels tedious and sloggy.

I worked on the scene for about a half hour. I didn’t have a burning desire to be in that scene, that struggle, but I opened the file for the same reason I’ve been putting sentences down for decades: because I had to. Because I needed comfort and control. Even when it’s work, the page is my refuge.

The writers I know, the writers I work with, the writer I am—we all started writing for the same reason: we needed to save ourselves. Our confusion and conflicts with the world differ, but the urge is the same: use words to find clarity and create beauty, through hours of quiet concentration.

For us, solace can be found on the page. And in the long run, words feel a lot better than whiskey and Ho Hos.

The last day I was in Denver a snowstorm canceled my plans to see a poet friend. I took it as a sign. I laced up my boots and headed to a coffee shop I’d noticed earlier in the week, determined to finish the scene that had been bugging me for weeks.

I took a seat by the window, watched the snow come down. I turned off my wifi and went full screen in Scrivener. Two hours later, I had done the work I set out to do. A small miracle in a broken world.

It’s hard to make art right now. And it’s vital. Grief, despair, and uncertainty: these are the reasons we make art. To turn our hurt inside out and examine it from various angles. To adapt the dense, meaty suffering that is being human to a form that someone else can understand. To make a beautiful sentence out of a beautiful mess.

I want to be clear: It’s OK if you cannot write a goddamn word right now. Sometimes grief is a companion; sometimes it’s a tsunami. Whatever you see and feel when you look out the window, I hope you’re doing what I’m doing: breathing, drinking water, connecting with loved ones.

Artists need community, and mine has been pulsing. We’ve been talking to each other about what art means. What role it plays in our lives, in the world. When I was younger, I thought how could art matter at a time like this? Now I know better.

As Toni Morrison wrote:

“This is precisely the time when artists go to work. There is no time for despair, no place for self-pity, no need for silence, no room for fear. We speak, we write, we do language. That is how civilizations heal.

I know the world is bruised and bleeding, and though it is important not to ignore its pain, it is also critical to refuse to succumb to its malevolence. Like failure, chaos contains information that can lead to knowledge — even wisdom. Like art.”

If you are ready to get back to your creativity, if you want to be in a room with people who care about story and want to connect through it, consider one of the offerings below.

And if you’re not ready for anything right now, that’s OK too. Reading books is a wonderful way to feed your writing brain without much effort. If you can’t read words, listen. There’s The Slowdown, where each 5 minute episode includes a little story and a poem, dusting you with language like sugar on a donut. Or try the live storytelling podcast, The Moth. Nothing gets me out of my head faster than somebody else telling me a story.

Many of you have heard me say that a writer is someone who writes. This is true, and it’s also true that you’re still a writer if you’re not actively writing. If you have written, if you want to write, if you have deep respect for the craft of language and story—you’re a writer, every goddamn day.

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Story Jam

On Friday, December 6, I’m hosting Story Jam, a live storytelling meetup that includes time to develop stories and share them in front of a supportive audience. If you are story-curious, this is a low-stakes, low-pressure entry point—there is no requirement to perform. You’ll meet some new folks and have a lot of fun. Doesn’t fun sound fun right now?!? More info and RSVP here.

New Story Connection class starts January 7th, next show is February 13

Story Connection continues in the new year—the next class starts at the ArtsCenter on January 7th (registration opens soon), and the next performance will be February 13th.

If you haven’t been a part of Story Connection yet, I urge you to make that one of your new year’s resolutions—the class is a great way to find your voice, gain confidence, and have a blast with new friends. And the show will blow you away: authentic stories that entertain and enrich. And for those of you not in North Carolina, you will soon be able to hear some of these stories online. Stay tuned for story joy.

Jupiter 2025

Ralph and I are hard at work planning the 3rd mission to Jupiter, a multi-day in-person retreat for writers working on book-length projects. We’ll have more info soon, but if you’re interested, give a listen to our podcast Writing In the Dark, where we explore the craft and process of writing, or join us on the Discord, where writers check in daily, share what they’re reading, how their writing is going, and bat around questions about everything related to the writing life.