Here’s a scenario I’ve lived through more than once and will likely experience again one day: I’m having dinner with a small group of people, chiming in only occasionally because I prefer to focus on my food and listen to everyone else. Without warning, someone says my name and proceeds to ask me questions about writing. Have I been writing? What have I been writing? Tell us about it what’s it about and when can they read it and oh for fuck’s sake Brenda why can’t you just leave me alone with this goddamn chicken leg?
I know, I know. Brenda is only making conversation and is trying to include me. She doesn’t mean any harm. She is a person with a fairly developed set of social skills. But, for me, this scenario, and variations of it, are painful. Not physically, of course, but in a way that makes me want roll up like a pill bug and disappear under the table all wrapped up in my protective shell. Talking about my writing makes me feel uncomfortable, especially out there in the meatspace. Part of this is because I’d rather Brenda or whoever just wait, then they can read for themselves the thing I’ve been working on. Sharing my writing is easy. Discussing it in person is not. One of the main reasons I write is so I don’t have to talk. I write these blog posts because it’s an easier way for me to talk about things.
Things like my anxiety and imposter syndrome.
When a well-meaning person like Brenda unintentionally puts me on the spot, I often fail to respond like a “normal” person. Sometimes, I manage to ask if we can talk about something else, but other times… fuck, those other times. When I look up from my plate and see all the faces around the table turned in my direction, eyes blinking and waiting for my answer, the anxiety takes over. My ability to articulate a sensible response in any human language leaves me. My face does odd, twitchy things and I stop making eye contact because that suddenly has become unthinkable. In really fun instances, my hands might even do a cool flappy thing. All of this is just what the people sitting around the table see. Inside me, the panic wave whooshes through my ears, cartwheels in my guts and stabs me in the chest. On a good day, I might successfully deflect with humor, or unsuccessfully attempt to deflect with humor in a way that comes off as abrasive and just plain shitty.
I realize this might seem like a melodramatic response to dinner conversation. That’s why I’m writing this. I’m trying to explain that for some people, mundane events can be challenging. Being the focus of attention when I don’t know everyone in the room well, or when there are too many people in the room, regardless of how well I know them, is overwhelming. I prefer to blend into the scenery, talking with one or two people at a time. More than that, and my pill bug fantasy starts rolling through my mind. I get nervous, and can’t focus.
I frequently want to be a pill bug regardless of conversation topic, because anxiety. Sure, I have anxiety meds. I don’t take them unless it’s an anxiety emergency because most of the time, the anxiety is manageable without the meds. Also, they make me sleepy. I might freak out for a time before or after social interactions to varying degrees, but prefer to rely on meditation and exercise before I break out the big med guns.
Like many creative people, there is an obnoxious voice in my head that chimes in at the worst times, shrieking at me that I am a big phony. When Brenda verbally yanks me away from that tasty chicken leg to ask about what I’m writing, this invites everyone in the room to ask questions or make statements of their own. Maybe what they say won’t be so bad. Maybe it’ll be the typical annoying stuff that people say to writers.
Maybe they won’t even be interested, (which is totally fine because I can get back to my chicken) or maybe they’ll say something awful like, “You know, you should get (insert famous name here) to blurb your book.”
No, sorry, Sharon. We don’t all hang out in the writer’s clubhouse with Stephen King and Michel Houellebecq. Some of us are posers and peasants and have not been granted access so stop throwing rocks at my ego and talk to Brenda.
The worst of this, though, is encountering people who, in my mind, have been granted to the artist’s clubhouse. Because of course, I feel like they are legit artists and I would like to just be an anonymous fangirl. When I speak to them IRL, all of the above mentioned anxiety stuff happens, but now it’s all whirled together in a nauseating bowl of social anxiety and imposter syndrome-fangirl soup. And there I am, attempting to masquerade as a human person with a vocabulary, but am clearly just a weird roly poly bug, bobbing around in this bowl of strange soup.
I try to pretend that I’m not drowning in soup. I make dumb jokes and act like a clown, which has been my go-to tactic for a variety of stressful situations for as long as I can remember. I babble, say stupid or inappropriate things, or I turn to the more socially confident person with me (usually my husband) and give him the look that says, “I can’t do this because I am in the soup again please scoop me out.”
When someone suggests doing a reading, I shut the notion down as quickly as possible. A reading. Out loud. In front of people. In a public place. Not happening. Sure, I would love to have the ability to charm and amuse people around the world by simply leaning on a podium and reading something the way David Sedaris does. I envy Chuck Palahniuk’s power to render audience members unconscious at his readings. But, that isn’t me. Chances are good that it will never be me. And I have accepted it. I am fine with it. While being able to make people pass out at a reading sounds pretty cool, I prefer J.D. Salinger’s hermit vibe.
Another suggestion that gives me the roly poly bug soup sweats is, “You could set up a table there, bring some books, and do a signing.” Oh, no. Please no. While that is not as terrifying as reading out loud in public, it still makes me twitchy.
People like Brenda who suggest these things sometimes even cross a line by saying, “But you HAVE to talk about your writing.”
Um… sure. But, when I want. How I want. And as much as I want. In more intimate situations, I enjoy talking about my work. However, coercing anyone to talk about anything they’d prefer not to isn’t okay. I write under a pseudonym for a reason. Using a pen name on the internet when I started doing this back in the early 2000s gave me the freedom to say things I never could out there in the fleshy real world. My worlds have collided a bit since then. It was bound to happen. I can’t hide behind the pseudonym anymore, but obscurity, anonymity, and rolling up like a threatened bug help to keep the anxiety at bay. In the meantime, I muddle through the nonsensical swamp of self-promotion and self-sabotage, trying to get people to read my writing while refusing to get up in front of people with it. It’s not a fun balancing act, but I deal with it. Mostly.
As long as Brenda leaves me alone with my dinner. Seriously, Brenda. You’re the worst.