The Perks Of Being a Middle-Aged Writer (Part #2)
A Literal Literary Loser Goes Dark
My first three Perks of Being a Middle-Aged Writer skimmed the surface. Time to go a bit deeper.
4) Your Kids No Longer Want You Around
When you’re a writer in your 20’s, 30’s and 40’s, odds are you have children. And those children always want something. Food, entertainment, to know what you’re doing, to say hi, a permission slip signed, a boo-boo kissed, to tell you, “Mommy, I tried to make my own breakfast. It was a DISASTER.” When I dropped my daughter off at pre-school, she cried, clung to my arm and sobbed, “But I want to be with you.”
My daughter just started 10th grade. Her oldest brother has a full-time job. The middle one is off to college. No one wants to be with me. They’ve made it clear how much they enjoy being without me. Time to write!
5) Knowing That This Too Shall Pass
In What You REALLY Need To Know To Be a Successful Author, I wrote: In order to be a successful author you must become a totally different person from who you actually are.
Here is who I am:
I am a person who, if a neighbor doesn’t smile at me in the elevator, can spend hours ruminating on what I may have done to offend them. If a friend doesn’t answer an email promptly, can spend days wondering what I said wrong. If a phone call is ended abruptly, I am devastated. I replay conversations from decades ago in my head and beat myself up over an awkward phrase. Sarcastic social media comments leave me fuming and composing responses in the middle of the night.
So, naturally, I became a writer, where rejection is basically a lifestyle.
I am a person who, before any task, is convinced I’m not up it and will fail. I don’t remember a day when I didn’t feel so overwhelmed at least once that just ending it all didn’t seem like the most logical and easiest solution. Before any social interaction, I plan out anything anyone might say to me, and what I should say in return. I constantly berate myself for not working hard enough, for taking breaks when I know others are working. I have never once slept through the night that I can recall.
(You know, my kids helpfully advise, those are signs of ADHD… of being on the spectrum… of this… of that… I am so glad they’ve gotten their medical degrees on Tik-Tok.)
So, naturally, I became a writer, where success means constantly working, and meeting new people, and taking on new projects, and never, ever knowing what the next moment may bring. (Rejection, it usually brings rejection, see above.)
But the beauty of being a middle aged writer is knowing that the depression and the anxiety of the moment/day/week/month will pass. Like my husband’s asthma. There will be flare-ups. But they will eventually go away. Now that I am middle-aged, I look at my anxiety and depression like the common cold. First, everybody gets them. Some more frequently, some with more intensity, but it’s basically the human condition, there is nothing special or interesting about it. And, like the common cold, it will eventually go away.
When my brain starts spiraling disaster scenario of how awful things are, how they will get worse, and how they will certainly never, ever get better, I remind myself that this has happened before. And, like a cold, it has passed. A year from now, I know I will look back on this particular heart-stopping, paralyzing terror and wonder why it ever got me so worked up. And then I will move onto the next one.
6) Having Middle-Aged Readers
But the best part about being a middle-aged writer is having middle-aged readers. When I first started out as a writer, I was in my 20’s. I knew, how to put this delicately, nothing.
My contemporary romance novel, “When a Man Loves a Woman,” featured two characters in their early 40’s. I was 28 when I wrote it. Re-reading it a couple of years ago in anticipation of re-releasing it as an e-book, I realized the characters had WAY too much energy for people in their 40s's.
As I wrote in my previous post, being a middle-aged writers means no longer worrying about being the hot, new, young thing.
And it means no longer worrying about writing books to appeal to the hot, new, young things.
You know who buys books? Middle-aged readers! And you know who knows what’s appealing to middle-aged readers? Middle-aged writers!
I had a blast doing remote book club talks for my last novel, “The Nesting Dolls.” (You can watch some of those talks at this link.) And I can’t wait to start doing them again for my next book, “My Mother’s Secret: A Novel of the Jewish Autonomous Region.” (If you’d like me to Zoom into your book club, email me!!!))
You know who attends book club talks? Middle-aged readers! And you know who totally gets that? Me! The middle-aged writer!
I have found my people! And they are me!