(via thewordunheard)

tesslynch:

Yo, you ever get a copy of a book with one of your stories inside?

It came. I cried. The end.

beenthinking:

Saturday surprise arrival!

Headed up north, unabashedly excited to have some long awaited reading material…

nakedpicturesofyourdad:

My copy of Coming & Crying arrived in the mail today, and Oh Boy!  To celebrate, here’s a still of the video that my story revolves around.

nightmare brunette

 

Here is how the first conversation went.

Me: Hey you guys.

Mom: Hey.

Dad: Hey.

Me: I got asked to be in an anthology!

Them: What! That’s great news!

Me: Yes! It’s an anthology about the human experience!

Mom: Wow…that’s so exciting.

Dad: Really? What about the human experience?

Me: Some of the parts of the human experience that you and I don’t often chat about!

Them: [dead silence]

Me: It’s a non-fiction sex anthology! Now don’t say anything yet.

Dad: That sounds cool!

Me: Wait, excuse me.

Mom: Can we have a copy? What are you going to write about? Oh, this is just great!

Me: Now I know you probably have concerns…

Dad: Wow, a book!

Me: Dad. It’s a sex book. Mom. Hello. Non-fiction sexy-time book writing. Now before you protest, let me —

Mom: Oh, stop that. Who cares.

Dad: Don’t be a prude. You’re not writing for your parents. Chill out.

Me: Well, it’s called Coming & Crying.

Mom: That’s funny!

Dad: L-O-L!

Me: Okay, this went better than I thought. I’m going to go tell Peter.

Mom: Yeah, sure!

Dad: [to my mom] It’s like she thought we’d be uncomfortable. I mean, we read her blog. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha.

Mom: Ha ha ha.

[they laugh at me as I hang up, confused]

This is how the second conversation went:

Me: I have some good news, and I have some complicated news!

Peter: Ooh, good news!

Me: I’m writing for an anthology!

Peter: That’s great! What about?

Me: Oh, just some non-fiction, nothing fictional at all. Just about, you know…well, it’s called Coming & Crying.

Peter: You’re not going to write about me, are you?

Me: No, I felt like that would be a little too weird.

Peter: You’re not writing about someone else, are you?

Me: Strictly speaking no, not anybody in particular.

Peter: What’s the complicated news?

Me: That was the complicated news.

Peter: Oh. Can I get a copy?

Me: Why aren’t you squirming uncomfortably?

Peter: Why should I squirm?

Me: I just want to make sure that you understand that the “coming” refers to —

Peter: Tess.

Me: Okay. So you know that when they say “coming” — I’m just saying this so I make sure you understand that what I’ll be writing about is —

Peter: Tess. Why are you being such a prude?

Me: So it’s perfectly fine for me to write about this.

Peter: You can write whatever you want!

Me: [really?] Oh, right, yeah, of course I can.

This is how the third conversation went:

Me: Hi Pam.

Pam: Hi.

Me: Good to see you here for a dinner of salad.

Pam: Let’s have some wine!

Me: You might want a lot of wine.

Pam: Why?

Me: Because…(bracing myself, talking fast) so like okay so I’m writing for this book and I didn’t ask your permission first so I changed your name, don’t worry about me having changed your name, which I did, but — let’s order wine.

Pam: You can’t start something like that and then make me wait for wine.

Me: Or can I? [we wait in silence for the wine. I wait as Pam drinks, pausing after each sip to let me talk except I won’t until the glass is empty and another has been poured] Okay?

Pam: That was a lot of wine.

Me: You’re in a story in a sex anthology and there’s nothing you can do about it because I sent it already.

Pam: Oh, sweet!

Me: Pam, don’t freak. Look. We were really young and nobody will know it was you. Except Lucy, if she reads it, she’ll know it’s you.

Pam: I don’t talk to Lucy anymore, she weirds me out.

Me: Great, then only you and I will know. And I have like a hundred friends named Pam so there’s some ambiguity. But let me buy you dinner. I feel horrible. I should have asked you first.

Pam: Oh, shut up, who cares. Can I get a copy of the book?

Me: Here’s what I did: I tried to keep you in mind as a reader. I tried to set boundaries. But I kind of ended up saying “fuck the boundaries.” I’m infinitely sorry. Maybe I can buy you a cashmere throw or something. God, I’m sorry.

Pam: What’s the matter with you? What’s the book called?

Me: Coming & Crying. 

Pam: Ha! That’s a great name!

Me: Forgive me Pam!

Pam: You’re coming off as strangely prudish. I don’t get you.

Me: I’m only prudish in retrospect.

I’m really excited for this book. It’s the first time I’ve been in a book. It’s the first time I’ve written non-fiction about sex. I’m glad my first was with two ladies I really trust.

(via tesslynch)

tylercoates:

I’m looking over the edits and comments from Meaghan and Melissa on my Coming & Crying story, and this a great way to start the week:

ha, I love a good Zima motif.

I’m glad that is such a UNIVERSAL SENTIMENT.

Matthew Gallaway lives in Washington Heights with his three internet famous cats, Dante, Zephyr, and Elektra, his partner, Stephen, and the George Washington Bridge. Melissa and I have fallen in love with the bits of his life he shares with us on Tumblr, but lucky for us, and the world, he has written a novel, called The Metropolis Case, which will be published by Crown in 2011. Even luckier for us, he agreed to contribute to Coming and Crying, with a story that made me cry in a coffee shop. I can’t wait for everyone to read it.

We emailed yesterday about the book, scratching on the surface of sex and storytelling and what it all means:

Q: So I have heard you, or read you, say that the world would be a better place if everyone who was behooved to write a book wrote one. What are some of the benefits, do you think, to sitting with yourself and sort of daring to do that? What did you learn— or what does writing do for you, on an individual level, on a capital-S Self level?

A: For me, I think the major benefit of writing — to put in psychoanalytical terms (I’m a big Jungian!) — is that it offers the opportunity to connect with and interpret one’s ‘unconscious,’ to have greater insight into why we act the way we do (because let’s face it: it’s often a mystery, particularly when we’re young!), with the hope that by doing so, we become more ‘human’ and perhaps even more rational, i.e., less reactive. Of course I’m not saying that to write a book is the ONLY way to do this, but I think it would be very difficult on some level to write one (or at least a novel) without some understanding of who we are at a very fundamental level, which can also be important in terms of developing a sense of empathy both for ourselves and others. In my case, I grew up as something of a bookworm and always had urges to write — I kept diaries and notebooks and things — but it was not until I ‘came out’ (to give one obvious example) that I developed the patience to write anything cohesive, to really tell stories, so to speak, and I think that’s probably because I was better able to decipher my own, if that makes sense. So when I talk about the world being a better place if more people wrote books, it refers to the idea that if more of us could afford the luxury (and unfortunately, it often is a luxury, given the demands — often painful — of daily life) of introspection and creation, I think it would lead to a more rational and considerate society.

Q: Now, we found each other on Tumblr. I started following you a few months ago and the little bits from your life you share almost always put me in a better mood. I think it’s very real, the way inviting people into our lives like that can affect us. So what about community? with this book, the community aspect is pretty vital. I know that reading my friends writing, or someone i admire, when they open up, helps me feel okay about doing the same. With all of the internet feedback, you can literally be encouraged to share when you wouldn’t otherwise. (and clearly this goes both ways). Does it help you, reading other people’s writing online (and off), to open up, too?

A: I should start by saying that ‘community’ is one of my least favorite words, because I think it’s too often used to pigeonhole people into groups in which they may not belong, or only on the most superficial or stereotypical level, e.g., I almost always cringe when I hear someone say ‘the gay community believes that ____’ or the ‘international community is upset that ____.’ That said, I understand what you’re saying and I would probably frame it terms of empathy or — to use the terminology of the literary critic/philosopher Richard Rorty, who is one of my heroes — ‘solidarity.’ To read others’ words and stories, I think, is one of the best ways we can not only develop our own language, but also to understand why we should recognize the fundamental humanity of another person or group of people; in Rorty’s view, the novel has been one of the great means by which our society has learned both to empathize with those who in the past would have been considered ‘outsiders’ (or even less than human) for whatever reason (gender, sexual orientation, ethnicity the most obvious), but also to understand humanity’s capacity for cruelty to one another (Nabokov and Orwell are two examples of this kind of writer). So in short, yes, I think reading (and respecting) the work of others (whether it’s a novel or an essay or a lolcat tumblr post) is absolutely essential in terms of ‘opening’ myself up to the viewpoint of others, and perhaps — as a second step — to incorporate their story/vocabulary into my own. (Rorty classifies those of us who are always searching for language like this as ‘ironists.’)

Q: A lot of our philosophy re: the book is grounded in the belief that storytelling eradicates shame and fosters compassion (to risk sounding utterly newnice), and that we dare each other on, so to speak, support each other, so that things have historically been not-so-easy to talk about, don’t hold so much discursive power, and can be seen more as they are— tough, wonderful, funny, sweet, scared— etc. have you felt that way? does that inform any of your writing?

A: OMG I think I just answered that, but yes — compassion is absolutely an element in all of this. I think this ‘newnice’ debate is interesting, and I happen to hate the term ‘nice’ because of course it’s rooted in a naivete or ignorance; I would rather think of it as the new-don’t-be-an-asshole movement, because I think such terminology is less likely to provoke people in the way ‘nice’ does (i.e., just to be labeled ‘nice’ makes me want to be an asshole on some level?) Now, I’m not a believer in any kind of fundamental ‘truth’ — at least in the German Romantic sense of the term (although I have been tempted many times, because I love Schopenhauer) — but I do believe that we as a society are capable of being less cruel, and part of this is rooted in the kind of compassion that I think you’re referring to, a sense of encouraging ALL people to tell their stories and to feel secure in doing so. This has been the fundamental arc of western civilization, I think — unless you want to be completely pessimistic about it, which is DEPRESSING — but we still have a long way to go. With regard to my own writing, I think that this has been a major theme, with the most obvious example presenting myself (or some of my characters) as non-heterosexuals, but with a thought to get beneath it to their fundamental humanity,  a capacity to love or hate or grieve or whatever else it is that makes us human. I personally believe that this view of compassion will eventually extend to other species as well, whether this means cats or trees or whatever else will ensure a more ‘balanced’ and ‘humane’ way of life going forward. (I think I probably just WAY out ‘newniced’ you, lol, but I can be a bit of a sentimental hippie at times!)

Q: What do you think about writing about sex? you do it in your novel, right? have any philosophy about it or The State of Sex in Literature?

A: Writing about sex is difficult for me personally, but I’ve gotten better at it and I absolutely believe that it’s important in terms of developing a sense of compassion or empathy for those who don’t share our inclinations. One of my own goals in writing about sex is not to ‘turn on’ anyone in an erotic sense (that’s what porn is for) but to basically demonstrate to readers that the character is fundamentally human and that their desires, as such, should not be mocked any more or less than anyone else’s. I think this is really where literary craft can play an essential role, because a good writer can pull this off with great passion or humor or whatever else, so that (again) we as readers lose sight of the fact that it’s a gay/straight/man/woman/whatever and is just a person, like the reader. In terms of the State of Sex in literature, it’s difficult for me to separate the question from the State of Gay Literature, which I think with a few exceptions is frankly abysmal in the modern era. I don’t believe that the ‘gay voice’ has been adequately recognized as a component of the post-war American literary canon, and needs to be taught in the same way that the works of ethic minorities and women are (although there remain great strides to be taken here as well, obv); what’s particularly ironic about this state of affairs is that so many of the early titans of the form (Melville, Proust, Henry James, Virginia Woolf, Thomas Mann, to name a few) were all non-heterosexuals, and this tradition was largely eradicated in the post-war era and frankly has yet to recover (Alan Hollinghurst, Michael Cunningham, Jeanette Winterson, Andrew Holleran, Edmund White and other post-war heroes of mine notwithstanding). But I don’t want to be TOO NEGATIVE because I myself wrote a novel with several gay characters at its core (oh, and cats!) and it was sold to a major publishing house, and not once did anyone say: ‘oh, you’d better turn down the gay, ok?’ One of the reasons I wanted to contribute to your project is that you — like many younger folks in my experience, which gives me hope! — are clearly looking for the ‘human’ dimension in all of this, and are NOT getting hung up on straight/gay/etc. So thanks again for asking me to participate — I’m honored that you asked and look forward to reading everyone else who submitted! (And of course the reactions of those who are generous enough to read.)

Melissa and I have been reading Tyler Coates’ blog on Tumblr for years now, and like many people, have always felt like we’ve known him. Like I told him in the interview, whenever we made list of contributors for the book, we always hoped he would be one of them. The short bio in the sidebar on his blog reads, “I live in Chicago. I have a day job, I go to grad school, and I write stuff on the Internet.” We met on gchat today to talk about that last part!

meaghan: So a lot of people affectionately call you Tyler Coates: Man About The Internet. We know it’s sort of a joke but, you really do open up on the internet in a way that makes people feel like they know you.

tyler: I guess! it’s sort of weird to think that, sometimes. The “people who read my blog” are sort of invisible, anonymous people to me? Even though I know a lot of them, I guess. It’s just jarring sometimes to have someone reference something on my blog, and then I have to come to terms (again) with the fact that I DO put a lot about myself on the Internet. Last year at the Tumblr meet-up in Chicago, someone said that they were amazed at how much I reveal about myself on the Internet. And I thought that was so strange, because I didn’t think I revealed THAT much. I’m “introspective” by nature, which is the polite way of saying “self-obsessed.”

meaghan: Ha! Be careful, you are in mixed company!

tyler: hahaha. Well. I say all of that in jest, because I’m beating other people to the punch? Everyone is self-obsessed, but not everyone has a blog. Someone once defending it by saying that I was “thoughtful.” Which I appreciated a lot, and eventually used as one of the three adjectives to describe myself on OKCupid.

meaghan: Ha! So you mentioned recently on your blog how you were understandably hesistant to write so personally for this book.

tyler: Yes, I was a little scared, mostly because I don’t write about sex on my blog.

meaghan: But what put you over the edge and said yes this is something i should do?

tyler:I think my rationale was, “I can’t turn down an offer to be a part of a book, especially if I’m in such good company.” And I think I’m going to have to get used to being a bit uncomfortable with a wider audience reading my writing if I actually want to write for a living. And the story I wrote was also one I’d been wanting to write for a while.

meaghan:It’s funny to me because when we were asking people to contribute, or thinking about people to ask, you were always on our list, from the beginning. Reading your blog made us feel like we knew you and that you had something to say, so to speak. We wanted to see you go there. Even though you never wrote about sex really on your blog, you did touch on dating and relationships.

tyler: Right. Something that I find frustrating is that I feel like I’m seen as this gay guy who is soooooo emotional. Because men, in general, are supposed to be stoic, and, hey, I’ve always been “emotional.”

meaghan: So like when people are like, “Oh you’re so EMO on your blog, you share so much.” It’s just relative to expectations of what a guy should be sharing.

tyler: Yeah! Personally, I hate that word (emo) because it doesn’t MEAN ANYTHING. It’s like “hipster” It’s boring. Come up with a new insult if that’s what you’re getting at.

meaghan: You’re right, now the word “emotional” is an insult. As if having feelings is something to be ashamed of (OY)

tyler: Right! And that’s why I get so confused when people claim I share so much about myself, and they could NEVER do that.

meaghan: It’s an interesting thing, especially with this book— saying, “Yes, I have sex and sometimes have feelings about it,” seems to some people like we are admitting something, when I’m thinking, “Um, we are all Human, remember? This is no secret! I know all of you experience the same thing!”

tyler: I feel like I am distrustful of people who DON’T think about it that way!

meaghan: Who don’t think about sex that way? or Life.

tyler: Right. I overanalyze everything. Once someone told me that he had trouble having a conversation with me because I thought too much about stuff. Which is THE OPPOSITE OF AN INSULT. And, luckily for him, I didn’t talk to him after that.

meaghan: Ha! So a lot of your story is about your first boy experience— what made you want to tell that story, you said you had wanted to for awhile

tyler: Well, mostly because I think it’s funny. Because the other half of the story is about my first STD scare (“Baby’s First STD Scare”), which is always a crowd-pleasing story. I think I wanted to tell the story not because the experience affected me so emotionally (it didn’t, really), but because it is the sort of experience that a lot of people have. I described the story to a lot of friends, and I heard the same thing: “I was so scared after I lost my virginity,” or “I immediately assumed I was pregnant.”

meaghan: yes! there is something in that storytelling, whether it’s over brunch or in a book where when you say it out loud or write it and other people say “Yes! me too!” it’s just the best feeling in the world.

tyler: This isn’t in the story, but when I was freaking over it, my father told me, “When I had sex for the first time, I was TERRIFIED.” Which is a sweet fatherly thing to hear, but also made me want to die because it was coming from MY FATHER.

meaghan: Well now you can hand this story to your children. HAHAHAHA. (God help us) Are you going to let your mom read this?

tyler: Probably not. I may eventually break down and tell her about it, but I don’t think she needs to read it. For one thing, she will figure out who the guy is!

meaghan: Ha! What about the guy?

tyler: I don’t talk to him anymore. I don’t think I talked to him much after we fooled around the one time. We’re Facebook friends!

meaghan: HAH I was just going to ask! Maybe he will buy the book.

tyler: That was why I did not post a link on Facebook!

Maria Diaz is a writer, professional tv watcher and tv blogger — a lady of many sharp charms and talents, and someone I met because I asked twitter for her. Turns out she lived in the same city, also spent all day on her laptop (this was San Francisco in 2008), and we knew the same internet. Though Maria is not vegan, she has had sex with vegans. That is what her story and this interview is about (and stay ‘til the end for her love poem to you all).

1:04 PM
Maria: yes, let’s do this!
mgg: wheep!
so! maria!
1:05 PM we lost you to the cold midwest. but oberlin is one of my favorite places. i have the diary i hauled all over campus when i was a ‘prospie’ sitting right on my desk right now.
have you told people there about C&C?
Maria: not yet!
mgg: it feels ‘very oberlin’ as a project
Maria: omg it’s SO oberlin
1:06 PM in my creative writing class yesterday, we had to tell an anecdote and the one thing one guy decided to tell was about very violent sex
this was the first day of class, mind you
so i think this is the right crowd for it!
mgg: i definitely got laid in the arb so.
i concur!
1:07 PM Maria: ha! the arb!
mgg: and one of our very first backers is a guy who used to have a performance art project where he blasted industrial music in the kitchen at harkness while standing in a huge tofu mixer, pouring soy milk over his body, clad only in a black apron
without oberlin, we’d be nothing!
are there hella vegans?
Maria: yes!
1:08 PM mgg: is there a vegansexual movement?
Maria: but i don’t know if the vegansexuals have a group yet
maybe it’s the “animal rights” group
and vegansexuality is their true agenda
mgg: i wonder where their agenda falls on honey
1:09 PM or on lube
Maria: only okay in oral sex?
there are vegan lubes!
mgg: i mean, i know there is vegan lube.
Maria: jinxxx!
mgg: JINX
so you are fighting fire with fire in your story
1:10 PM the subject is a guy who wrote a vegansexual manifesto
which he showed you after sex?
has he seen your piece?
Maria: he showed me after the sex, the morning after
he was very proud of his writing
1:11 PM he showed me several clips, like he was pitching me, almost
mgg: HA
BLOGGER!
Maria: EXACTLY! always be closing!
mgg: /dies
Maria: he has seen my piece because this anonymous dude who reads my blog sent it to him
trying to start a fight
mgg: oh of COURSE
Maria: but he has never contacted me
1:12 PM i thought he would since his words are so precious to him
mgg: i’m not sure what’s more wounding — the description of his sexual skillessness, or the dis on his writing
1:13 PM actually
Maria: both are bad, but his lack of skills were what did it
mgg: it’s sort of yelpy
to advance the food theme for a sex
*sec
like, the san francisco cult of yelp, which i can’t read this story without imagining
like, the way they would be all up on a restaurant (like the one where the story starts) opening w/o a liquor license
1:14 PM and the drama of that
Maria: or a place that serves foie gras
mgg: exactly
so why not review his plating technique, as it were
Maria: well, that’s part of what made me so pissed. like how dare he say that shit to me when he wasn’t even any good!?
mgg: writers!
Maria: you must avoid them
1:15 PM mgg: because you never know
san francisco was so good for providing opportunities for memoir that way
1:16 PM Maria: oh man, yes.
there’s a type you can only find there
i think this guy has moved onto an animal sanctuary
mgg: and the local writing scene was a little more brazen about how essentially you were all just reporting back on fucking one another
Maria: where he can be pure and avoid animal product cemeteries like me
1:17 PM mgg: i am sure his helio gets perfect service there
Maria: or his motorola Razr
let’s be real!
mgg: was that a bonus for you, in doing the piece? that he might see it?
1:18 PM stephen elliott tried to say that he’d never fuck someone just to write about it
i’m not in that camp, not really
but then that you can make up for awful sex by bringing a story out from it —
1:19 PM Maria: yeah, kind of
just so he could learn something?
i just didn’t want to participate in any earnest email discussions about his moral beliefs
mgg: But what about you?
Did you get anything out of it — as a lady, as a writer?
1:20 PM Maria: yes! it’s a great story, and i’m kind of in your camp, that out of any awful situation, you can at least get a story out of it
and in thinking where i was mentally that night, it was proving to myself that i could want something and get it, even if the result wasn’t amazing
sometimes a lady needs to do that
1:21 PM mgg: which most people would say is so unladylike
1:22 PM but this where i look back to patti smith and joan didion and propose, once you write at all as a woman, whether it’s about sex or not, you are taking a willful step outside of polite society
1:23 PM which is better than being in a workshop when it’s nice out?
do you have writing project plans while out there?
1:24 PM Maria: yes, i’m taking this great class called “concepts of scene” which is all about story telling
so i’ll have a lot of writing to do, just for that
this place lends itself well to writing, because there is literally nothing else to do but that, drink cheap beer and eat tofu
1:26 PM mgg: or drive to Cleveland to buy porn
thank god some college towns have a sense of history about them!
maria, where can people find you on the internet right now?
(outside of gchat)
Maria: my tumblr! which is at onesharpbroad but gchat is where i take visitors
1:27 PM like a lady does
mgg: i will pass that along.
and thank you for the story — i’m editing it now (with a submission we got that i can’t believe we got, which has phrases like “went down” and “cum” in quotes, with all sincerity.)