Now that I’m about two-thirds of the way through the first draft, I guess I can tell y’all (without jinxing myself) that—rather to my astonishment—I have been feverishly writing a novel. Without going too far into it, let’s just say, broadly, that it’s fast and funny, and set in three different time periods in Austin: the 1890s, the 1990s and 2023.
This past week I did research of two widely different varieties. On Monday, I entered the hallowed halls of the Harry Ransom Center Archives, on the hunt for a very specific, fairly obscure late 19th century journal I knew resided there. Walking up to the information desk, I couldn’t not note how young the children working there seemed.
On some level I understood they weren’t actually children. But I don’t think one of them was older than 20. I had an epiphany. Not only am I getting older, but everyone else is getting younger. The clerks, the doctors, the workers, ALL THE PEOPLE—or at least the majority of them—seem to be younger than me and quite a few of them are much, much younger. Put another way, when I was forty, it would have been impossible for me to encounter any other humans forty years younger than me. Because they did not yet exist. And now they’re everywhere.
The incredibly young info desk clerks were very nice. They pointed me to another desk, where, for the second time, I announced my newness to this scene, my complete lack of knowledge as to protocol. I suppose I was attempting a preemptive strike, faux-cheerfully announcing my stupidity before they could judge me for it, my tone a cross between an excited eight-year-old, a defensive teenager, and the (chronological) adult I am, the one with imposter syndrome in academic settings.
One clerk sat beside me to give me a quick lesson on how to use the search engine. “It’s so easy!” She said cheerfully. Then she punched so many keys and moved through so many screens so swiftly that I nearly experienced vertigo. I did not give into my desire to say, “Slow down there, young lady! You lost me six screens ago.” Instead, I leaned into doddering, understanding my long white braids might as well be a neon sign on my forehead flashing this word.
Doddering. Blink. Doddering. Blink.
That trip to HRC brought into sharp focus that any time I venture out of my safe zone—basically the ranch and the museum where I work—I feel increasingly awkward, out of place, disoriented. I don’t mind being perceived as doddering because it’s how I perceive myself more and more lately.
I was trying to explain this to my son, who just turned 33*. (*Wait, what?!) I likened my new reality to that other ridiculously difficult transition period: teenhood. I told him it’s all too much at once, so much to navigate and plenty of cliches coming true. Days I’m not entirely invisible to the young people around me, I’m positive those who do notice my presence classify me without deep consideration directly into the Old Person File. I know this because I only realize now that I did it myself. I remember being at Molly Ivins’ 60th birthday party. I was 40. I could never imagine being as old as all those fiery old women were. I guess the joke’s on me now.
The reading room at HRC was sparsely populated so I was confused when a young man set up beside me and opened a file. I tried giving him the side eye to suggest he go find his own table—we were surrounded by many other empty ones. I was shocked—outraged!— at how boundaryless he was. And when he said something I couldn’t hear (thanks to all those concerts I spent up against speaker stacks), I said to him, not without some impatience, “Are you talking to me?”
As a matter of fact he was. For, you see, he was one of the desk clerks I’d spoken to minutes before—now unrecognizable to me because he was standing beside me, entirely out of the context in which we’d met. He wasn’t an insensitive fellow researcher hogging my space. He was an employee bringing out a file that was part of the archives I had requested. He was helping me.
As my mistake dawned on me, my mind went whipping in the opposite direction, from indignant to repentant. I began apologizing to this young man. Though I was sure I was whispering, I got this feeling my voice was thundering through the space, disrupting others. I worried I’d stood too close to the researcher as I over-apologized, only making matters worse with the morning’s coffee and garlic still lingering on my breath.
Doddering. The word ricocheted around my mind as I exited, delighted to have found and photographed the journal and its pages, exhausted from having performed this task, no longer the spry researcher I had once been as a young journalist.
The other research was pure joy. Thankfully The Polyphonic Spree show last night started at 8, not quite my bedtime, so I was excited to be able to see them play. I first made friends with frontman Tim DeLaughter when the band was brand new, storming SXSW 2001. Henry was ten and we followed them around to a number of shows during the festival. I got their manager Chris Penn’s card and called him on the final Sunday, inviting them over for brunch. There were twenty-six members in the band then. The whole lot of them showed up at our falling down rental cottage in Hyde Park. Tim nearly broke his ass on Henry’s backyard half-pipe.
Watching them play for the gazillionth time last night, I was visited by the same montage that always comes to me at their shows. Tim has been such a good friend to us both, but especially to my son. Henry’s first date, in sixth grade, was to a gig they played at Stubbs. I was chaperone and Henry offered his library card as ID to retrieve our guest list tickets. He got a personal shoutout from Tim that night and I’m going to say I’ll bet no other sixth grade date in the history of humankind was even half as cool. Henry has also played on stage with them once—hands down the most ecstatic I have ever seen him. Most importantly, Tim is a Great Encourager and surely one of the reasons my son, an incredibly gifted, self-taught multi-instrumentalist, developed such a passion for playing.
Though my main goal was to simply enjoy the show, valuable research arrived as I remembered, with visceral clarity, the absolutely ridiculous number of shows I went to, very often accompanied by my kid, back in the old days. That’s a feeling I need to capture in words to make my novel—dare I say it—truly sing.
As exceptional luck would have it, opening for The Spree was a young man named Noah Faulkner. He’s a fifteen year-old pedal steel guitar player. Every day on IG he gifts us a new video. Each video has these elements: Noah at the pedal steel guitar (sometimes wearing Crocs), his bandana clad dog Kara in front of him smiling at the camera, and behind him his 13 year-old brother Nate on bass. Noah announces the song he will be playing and it’s always one of his mom’s favorites—her sublime taste including a vast array of ‘80s and ‘90s classics like Love Will Tear Us Apart, Finest Work Song, Purple Rain, Friday I’m In Love, and on and blissfully on.
Last night Kara the dog stayed home but was represented by a hilarious life-size cutout. The brothers’ dad, Jay, joined them onstage along with a drummer (sorry I didn’t get his name). The boys’ mom was up against the stage barrier documenting it all with her phone. I introduced myself and thanked her profusely for the joy her family is bringing to this increasingly hostile world. And I couldn’t resist taking a photo of her taking photos of her family onstage. For in this joyful moment I was returned to the days when I leaned against stages snapping away at my own teenage son shredding it on the guitar I nearly went broke buying him.
I’m cautiously optimistic about this novel. Maybe it will be the one I finally push out into the world, unlike all the others (I literally have lost count how many novels I’ve written) piled dusty on the shelf. No matter what, I am happy to report that the research alone has made the effort worthwhile as I come to accept my doddering and allow myself guilt-free emotional benders down Nostalgia Lane.
NOTES:
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I have FINALLY posted a link to BUY TICKETS TO MY BIRTHDAY SHOW AT HYDE PARK THEATRE. This year I’m turning SIXTY. It’s a matinee since I’m not driving at night. Sunday January 7, 2024. Starts at 3 pm. Featuring: Kriss Kovach, Sarah Barnes, Janna Garza, Ellen Stader and the INIMITABLE Southpaw Jones. $25 per ticket. There are only 66 seats available. And yes, there will be cake.
Speaking of Southpaw Jones, he and Matt the Electrician will be playing their annual, hilarious Holiday Show on Wednesday 12/6 at the ‘04 Center. Click this link to buy tickets. It’s going to be freaking awesome.
You can read more about Noah Faulkner in this Great Texas Monthly Article. And I encourage you to follow him on IG @pedalsteelnoah for a daily dose of pure positivity.
Check out The Polyphonic Spree’s brand new gorgeous album Salvage Enterprise. It is so lush and gorgeous. Some of Tim’s very best work. And if you get the chance GO SEE THEM.
I love all of this. I’ve been kicking around the idea of writing a multigenerational novel set in Austin as well, for years, so I’m encouraged that you’re gonna go first and I can continue to put mine off for a few more decades. 😜
You always manage to make me laugh despite it all, and HOLY SHIT I am excited about you writing and publishing a fictional novel.