Imagine: Late March, 2020. Nighttime. After grading work, designing lesson plans for remote learning, and answering a slew of messages from my concerned and understandably overwhelmed high school students, I’m trying to write a Twitter pitch. This particular pitch will be used for a Twitter event (one of many out there) where I’ll pitch my book to literary agents and editors in the hopes it leads to an offer of representation. This pitch event comes after spending more than a year writing my middle-grade novel, sending it off to critique partners, revising it, and perfecting the dreaded query letter. It’s all part of my years-long attempt to become a traditionally published author.
Flash forward: I pitched my book, and it got a lot of attention. I’m still early in my querying journey with lots of positive feedback to show for it.
But along the way, I’ve wrestled with a small yet not inconsequential question: who cares?
After all that effort, all that work, all those days hoping and dreaming…I can’t help but sit back from my computer and ask, “who the [insert expletive] cares?”
Seriously. Here I am, trying to publish a cute, heartwarming story for 8-12 year-olds amidst a deadly and scary virus, racial injustice, a fumbling government, and a fracturing economy. Who, on this vast green earth, cares? Why should my book matter? Why have I chosen to divert my time, energy, and heart into writing a book in the face of all the life-altering turmoil around me?
There happens to be a very good reason. Several, actually.
I’m going to challenge a quote from a cliché movie DEAD POETS SOCIETY (and while I admit it’s totally cliché I still love it…you can judge me a bit). At one point in the film, Mr. Keating gathers his students in a huddle and says, “…medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for.”
I’m gonna disagree with him, just a bit. Because I believe, like medicine and law, art also sustains. Art makes life possible. Back in March when my state, along with much of the world, went into Lockdown, I made an inventory of how to stay physically, mentally, and emotionally healthy. I decided to start exercising at home in addition to walking my massive Labrador retriever. I’m lucky enough to live in a home in a residential area where both are possible. I brainstormed novel ways to maintain my friendships and be social (Zoom brunch! FaceTime family chats!) Books, movies, music, and TV shows also became an integral part of how I restructured my life and decided to spend my time. Without these entertainment outlets, my time being stuck at home would be unbelievably miserable. I’m sure many others feel the same way. Whenever I’m feeling low, I’ve always turned to a favorite book, movie, or TV show to lift me up, give me a laugh, and help me forget about my troubles. That has never been more true than it is today.
And all of these stories, whether told on the page or on the screen, exist because someone took the time to write them. Someone put their ideas to the page and produced a story to share with others.
Am I not doing the same thing?
People have always needed stories as a way to escape. They will need stories after Covid-19, too. No one might care about my book now, but it’s my deepest hope they will care, one day, when it’s published and out in the world. I hope my book will offer people an escape and provide them with joy, the same way so many other stories have done for me.
My writing has sustained me more than it ever has before. Writing gives me hope, for myself and for my fellow writers, as we push forward with our dreams in defiance of the hurricane swirling around us. Because we know that no matter what happens, for better or worse…the world will always needs another story.