Today, after living in this house for three years, I’ve finally got some bookcases coming. I’ve looked at every catalogue, gone to every second hand store, bought and returned two different cases. I found a young man who can build anything and he designed a bookcase that will perfectly fit my wall, and the trim will match the trim about the window. I already know that I will be sad to see the piles of books on the floors go. I hate change of any kind, even for the better. I don’t hate it exactly, I just get tremendously attached to certain things being a certain way. I have a fantasy to paint them the way Virginia Woolf painted hers. Or maybe Vanessa Bell painted them, but the sides were decorated with harlequin panes and I remember being completely delighted by them.  But I’m too much of a pussy. Plus I can’t paint. When I was pregnant I made the mistake of trying to paint a dresser and trompe l’oeil a side table.

I know I’ve talked about bookcases before; but it’s the closest thing I’ve got to a soul.

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I threw a book party for John last night. His novel The Variations was displayed everywhere, daffodils on every surface and a loaded bar. A literary brawl broke out over the relevance of Chekhov, cocaine was snorted off my Ouija board, a tall young man looking for an agent pretended he wasn’t, and I made a speech for John that was all about me. When the last person left at 1:00 a.m., John and I shared a drunken kiss and walked up Sixth Avenue to a crappy hotel. Heaven.

Have a great weekend. Love, Betsy

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Today, the flood of men and women exiting the subway reminded me of grade schoolers lined up for a field trip. I could see their childhood faces, their satchels and cases, their laces lovingly tied, buckles buckled. I felt a rare happiness when I refilled my Metrocard and walked through my city feeling more alive than not. A man held a door open for me, a banker asked after my health. And a pale girl with thick braids rolled a cigarette with a tiny filter and wrote along its side: n’est pas une pipe. This is where I used to walk, these bricks, that window casement, the neon sign in the delicatessen with apple turnovers the size the tricorn hats. My first love was a boy named Chris who played a steel guitar. And we sat there. And shared a pastry.

Who was your first love? Have you written about him or her?

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Dear Betsy,

I am a blog follower whose debut novel is coming out in April. We are having a small book launch in a friendly independent bookshop in London. I haven’t spoken in public since my sixth grade debating team and I am afraid I will shrivel up and forget my first son’s name. What suggestions do you or your readers have for 1) being relaxed not drunk 2) making people laugh or be interested in what I am saying and most importantly 3) choosing an appropriate passage from my novel. Should I choose something saucy? something introductory? For how long should I speak/read? It is a women’s commercial novel and I don’t have a strong speaking voice. Should I ask a friend to read who speaks BBC English?

Thank you, NAME WITHHELD

Dear Debut Author:

First and foremost: Congratulations. What a great accomplishment. If you like, send in a link to the book so we can all decide if we are happy for you or jealous of you. As to your questions:  I think you should read and speak for three or four hours without ceasing. Ask your friend with the BBC English to ask three-part questions  from the audience. Have her ask some in a cockney accent, and an Australian accent for fun. Saucy is good, but dry is better. It will be easier to make people like you if you wear something super tight, preferably your DVF wrap-around, and give out good swag. Oh, and ask your son to wear a hat that has his name on it. Be creative and good luck!

Anyone have anything to add?

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Got back on the horse tonight, meaning I sent the beast out again. Click. And with it every wish I’ve ever had since I wrote my first pear. A good friend recently said, all you can do is get it out there. I am a murderer of dreams. So, here it is, the foot on the other shoe, the cake you made, now sleep in it. We must, we must, we must increase out bust. This is your brain, this is  your brain on submission. The only bad review is no review. Does the word matter if it sits in your desk, if your desk belonged to Jackie O, if the night and sleep are the best part of the day only you can’t sleep. The bed is cold. Your nightgown holds on to its last button. Where is the Benadryl?  Click and you are dust, you are golden, you are sitting on the train, and out of the left window a sunrise that means absolutely nothing. This is not a sign.

Do you see signs?

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I can’t tell a lie: I’m trying to write this post during the commercial breaks in AMC’s season premier of Mad Men.I’d  give my left testicle to be a writer on the show. Guys, I’m feeling really sorry for myself tonight for no good reason except I’m in the all too familiar hell of waiting to hear from someone about my blah blah blah. I’d like to be the Silver Fox with his insouciance and never ending cigarette. Or even a secretary with a paper dress and colorful cardigan draped across my slim shoulders. I’d like to put Brill Cream all over my body and fuck somebody standing up. I want to be Betty Draper, skittish and angry and girdled. Or Joan, post-partum Joan. I want to be one of the kids on the creative team yukking it up in the coffee room. I’m a jealous son of a bitch. I hate everyone.

Who do you hate?

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Dear Betsy,

I’m an aspiring writer and am at my wits end.  I’m trying to write a novel about life as a scientist (my former life) and I’m getting nowhere fast.

I’m wondering if you provide consulting advice to people such as myself.  I could pay you for your services.  Please let me know if this is possible.

Many Thanks, NAME WITHHELD

Dear Mad Scientist:

That’s so funny. I tried to write about life as a bitch on wheels (my former life), but I couldn’t get the tone right. Then I tried to write about life as a Rockette  (former life) but  the sequins jammed my keyboard. I tried to write about life as a Julia Child impersonator (former life)  but I couldn’t truss a chicken. Then I tried to write about my life as a Rabbi (my former life) and I prayed with all my soul and all my might and I still couldn’t figure out why this night was different than all other nights or if I wanted or just thought I wanted Jonathan Safron Foer’s new American haggadah. I also tried to write a novel about life as a novelist (my former life) with an eight billion dollar brownstone in Brooklyn or a big audience in France or a nervous breakdown or a bad breath or faith.

You can pay someone to teach you how to write. pay someone to write your book for you, edit or consult. Or go back to a field that yields identifiable results and might possibly move the needle. Like science. WHoever you are, I love you. Turn back!

What is your former life?

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This is your writing. This is your writing on drugs.

Come clean: how many of you blaze before you write? How many lubricate? Who thinks they’re better on drugs? More flow? Less inhibition?  Less self-consciousness? More open, alive, aware? Wasn’t it Woody Allen who said that getting a laugh off of a stoned person didn’t count? Wasn’t it Robert Lowell who said that a little salt in his brain could have spared people a lot of suffering? Wasn’t it Jerry Garcia who said Casey Jones You Better watch Your Speed. I just want to say that I am AGAINST drugs (in case my teenager or her friends are reading this, which they aren’t because it’s not Facebook).

What’s the worse addiciton: weed or Facebook? Do you blaze when you write? Sharers get more: true or false?

AND BIG Congrats to our very own Tetman Callis on the publication of his first novel, HIGH STREET. You’ve read the comments! Now read the book! Watch the YouTube!

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I call it the twilight zone. It’s that fateful time between when you’ve corrected your proofs and when the book comes into the world. Apart from social networking yourself up the ass, there is nothing you can do: you’ve written your book, it’s been committed to type, it’s going to the printer, it will emerge  with its own jacket and bar code. Fine, if only the writer could put his brain on ice, or escape to a tropical island, or whip himself into a frenzy attacking a new project. The last is the only inoculation I know of that staves off  pre-publication shpilkes.

You can not help but dream that your book will hit the list, that you’ll banter with Colbert,  opine on NPR,  that the movie rights will be sold. To Clooney! To Scorsese! To Spielberg!  The only good thing about Oprah going off the air is that perfectly reasonable people no longer think they are going to be her guest, or should be. Never, not once, has a writer ever said to me that he thinks his book will have a modest success or almost no impact, even though most books don’t sell enough copies to feed a small family in East Islip  for a month. Writers are dreamers, and never are the dreams more heightened than awaiting publication.  Finally! Finally! An editor I know once likened book publishing to the funeral business given how many books get buried.  Sadly, more people will probably show up for your funeral than your book signing. Oh dear lord, I am feeling the darkness today. Beautiful weather always brings out the worst in me.

What’s the worst part?

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I heard this NPR segment today about the harvesting of organs. Apparently, after they take you off the ventilator to make sure you are brain dead (and you are), they put you back on the ventilator to oxygenate your lungs and organs so that they are in the best possible shape for transplant. Some believe you are alive when they hook you back up and this makes the harvesting process seem somewhat disturbing. Others understand that the person is gone and the organs are being kept vital.

What does this have to do with writing?

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