Heavy Eyeliner Companions
My best friend was a writer before I even knew I was. She was the “typical artsy type” with her heavy eyeliner and clothing reminiscent of Aria Montgomery. In a way, she visibly represented the kind of person I wanted to be, with her bubbly nature and edgy style, and her notebooks filled to the brim while mine lingered at half full or half empty, depending on my mood. She’s always the first person I want to read my work. Our coffee house chats have turned us into those annoying aspiring writers we all know who loudly discuss their projects over chai tea and expresso. But we loved it.
She’s an English major too, a few hours away, and she used to talk about trying for an MFA with me. We’ve been our own little literary community for so long it almost seems like a romantic relationship, and it’s hard to imagine being with anyone else. But as time between our visits becomes longer and the prospect of her joining me in the future seem dimmer, I wonder if maybe I need to let go of this long distance debacle and find something more concrete. It can be scary, going out into the world and finding others to look at your most vulnerable and intimate self: your writing. But it may be necessary, if only to have those loud expresso fueled conversations face to face rather than through Skype or phone call (which can be nice, but definitely not the same). I want to find those people with their heavy eyeliner and interesting clothes, who actually look like writers and artists while I sport t-shirts and Uggs. I want to find the people who will read my writing and tell me it’s amazing while simultaneously telling me it sucks. I want to rekindle a dying flame, with others if not with my best friend.
I look around campus sometimes and wonder who these people could be. The girl with the thigh tattoo? The guy with the black finger nails and a coffee always in hand? Or the girls like me in Uggs and over sized shirts, the “artists incognito.” But how do you just go up to these people and say “hey, wanna be literary companions?” The closest I’ve gotten to a community here is during workshops in my earlier creative writing classes (which did prove fruitful, one of the stories I had work shopped is transforming into a novel before my eyes). I guess I miss those workshops, where the community is your classmates, and we could be honest without worrying about hurting a friend’s feelings. Something I’m sure my friend worried about a ton.
