THE FOREST FOR THE TREES is about writing, publishing and what makes writers tick. This blog is dedicated to the self loathing that afflicts most writers. A community of like-minded malcontents gather here. I post less frequently now, but hopefully with as much vitriol. Please join in! Gluttons for punishment can scroll through the archives.
If I’ve learned one thing about writers, it’s this: we really are all alone. Thanks for reading. Love, Betsy
This week I kept hitting a wall with my writing project. I could barely concentrate. I drank an oil tanker worth of diet soda. I pruned my bookcase. I pruned my manuscript pile. I shopped for bras online. I literally drove to the nearby Krauser’s and bought more diet soda, three bulls eyes, and three tootsie rolls. I cleaned my monitor. I cleaned my glasses. I printed out the pages and started reading them aloud, fell asleep. I had a saintly cup of green tea. I walked the dog twice. I put away two baskets of laundry. I watched a Keanu Reeves movie.
True confession: I’m in love with Keanu Reeves. Have been since Point Break. Every day a picture of him shows up in my Instagram feed. Bewhiskered, clean shaven, on his motorcycle, walking through an airport. Sometimes the clip comes up where Stephen Colbert asks him what do you think happens when we die. Keanu takes a deep breath then says, I know the ones who love us will miss us.
Thanks to everyone who left a remembrance of Shanna. It all rang true. It was wonderful to spend a few more moments with her. She was all that and more. I guess I want to talk about suicide. I was 24 when I made an attempt, one semester into graduate school, having battled depression since I was fifteen, romanced by writers who who took their own lives, Plath, Sexton, Woolf. My love of their work, Lowell too, fused with my depression. I didn’t know if I was a cliche or a chicken. I thought you had to be brave to take your life. I was so ashamed when I failed. People say, “it was just a cry for help,” when you don’t succeed at taking your life. It’s so fucked up. It’s like they’re disappointed. As if a cry for help is pathetic and weak. A cry for help is the most profound thing of all. I don’t know the final days or hours of Shanna’s life. I don’t know about the last days of George’s life. Did they go off their meds? Did one voice crowd out all others? Did not wanting to live become wanting to die? Did wanting to die become a one way street. For anyone out there reading this post, please cry for help. Please get help. I am here thanks to Lithium, Lamictal, and years of therapy. But mostly the meds. Sorry, therapists. But all the insights about my childhood didn’t put the floor beneath me or the ceiling above me.
It breaks my heart to share with you, beloved readers of this blog, that we lost Shanna Mahin last week when she took her life. She was an early, rambunctious, defiant, hilarious and generous member of this community. She was demanding in the best possible way, critical in the smartest possible way, searingly honest and screamingly funny. She once dared me to a weight gain competition. We were yo-yo dieting twins separated at birth. I don’t know the circumstances that led to this tragic and final act. Beloved Shanna, fuck fuck fuck. You were dearly loved and will be sorely missed. I am so sorry we lost you. I want to say one thing to anyone struggling out there: life wants you at least as much as death. Life wants you at least as much as death. If you are struggling, get help. There is help. And there is hope.
Please leave a memory of Shanna or any words you’d like to celebrate this brilliant writer’s life.
I finished the revision of a chapter today that I’ve been working on for weeks. How do I know? My cuticles are bloody, my skin is blotchy, I’ve been wearing the same clothes for days. I’ve printed it out, read it out loud, forced myself to go back and check facts and rewrite sections that were slacking. I deleted A LOT. I ran it under the scanner and took out all the too cute or clever lines. Except one. Let’s see if it flies with the editor. Some people believe revision is more difficult than writing. Some feel it’s where the magic happens. I feel wiped.
“The Launching of Rochelle Epstein” was my single attempt at a novel in 1987. I squeezed out about 30 pages before the thing collapsed on itself. I’ve been working with writers for 30+ years and I don’t have a clue how fiction writers create their worlds then march their characters through them. I can help with plot points, I can tweak dialogue, or question a character’s motivation, but I don’t know how you get past the 30 page mark. How does the imagination unspool, how do the sentences get in line like a flock of geese? How do you go back the beach, the forest, the runway? The bridge table, the rest stop, the last best thing?
Betsy Lerner 