Lord, why does my mind keep going in circles? It’s like a seasonal weather event, asking myself the same question: Why do I write?1 This often coincides with the arrival of a royalty statement, a negative review (or the lack of reviews), or yet another rejection. Why do I write? Why bother with writing when the returns are so low? Why bother with it, when life is so short and there are so many other things to do?
This time this nagging question was triggered by spending time in Argentina, surrounded by friends and family with zero literary preoccupations — normal people, folk concerned with normal things, enjoying life, living it to the best of their abilities, without chasing ever-unreachable literary carrots. True, I was already weakened after a round of correspondence with several agents and publishers — a sterile attempt to place a Walt Disney of a manuscript that’s been cryogenically frozen for four years. But it was dipping my toe in normality for just over ten days that tipped me…
