Writing is the great cluster buttfuck when Other Writers decide they want a piece of you. Writing is not nirvana. Writing is not romantic. Writing is not a birthday party for the writers.

Writing is work. It’s fucking hard. And then there are the editors.

Please. Spare. Me.

The editors are our friends.

And I am Marie of Romania.

The editors are there to keep you out. The publishers are there to keep you out. The Other Writers are there to spit in your beer.

If you can’t do it, teach it. I do. My students are boys at risk with HIV.

You could never teach these boys writing in a typical classroom. You would not know where to begin.

We have constructed a VOOK. Narrative. Video. Photography. It was their idea. Not mine. They slaved and they sweat with it.

Because it’s about a THEM in a place where there is no THEM. Because they are always so typically silent, no one really knows they exist. But now they have writing. God help them. I have no idea if it will help.

JUST BEFORE THE CURE. There isn’t a romantic notion in it (except for mine). I guess they’re writers now. Or something.