One Last Note This Year
A short thank you, and a small piece of writing
Hey everyone,
This is my last update of the year — a little pre-Christmas one.
I won’t make it long. Many of us are busy getting ready for the holidays and the New Year celebrations. Just two simple things:
First, I want to say thank you. Thank you for reading my writing, for following my rollercoaster ride as an author, and for your support throughout the year. It makes a huge difference to know that there’s a group of people out there, somewhere, cheering you on from afar.
Second, a few updates ago I promised you a short piece from my Steering the Craft course. Here it comes — a brief, unpolished read to wrap up a busy year. I’ll paste it below this newsletter so it doesn’t break the flow up here. As always: I’m curious to hear what you think 😊
If you celebrate Christmas, I wish you wonderful holidays! And for everyone else, I hope you get to enjoy some quiet days before the new year too, with plenty of time to read a good book or novel. My holiday selection: Ursula Le Guin’s The Left Hand of Darkness, Rodney Stark’s Discovering God, and Anne Applebaum’s Twilight of Democracy are waiting for me — all excellent inspiration for my craft and books #3 and #4.
I’ll see you in the new year with a Birthright launch date and cover release.
Until then, keep reading.
Always keep reading.
Max
Exercise from Steering the Craft
Write a scene where rhythm and movement of sentences mirror action, emotion, physical reality.
The train is pulling out of the station, any noise of its wheels accelerating on the steel beams below me gently cancelled out by my AirPods. The sun just started climbing behind the office buildings that rise in our district’s commercial center, bathing everything in rose and amber colors. It is a sight I can never get enough of, so peaceful and calming, a reliable reminder that no matter what awaits me on any given day, the world will keep spinning, and life will wander on along its mysterious paths.
Rush hour is still far away, and so it’s only three other people with me in the quiet train compartment. At the other end is a homeless man who has turned eight seats into a temporary bedroom. A slim mattress rolled out on the floor. His belongings, his world, packed on the seats towering around him. Sleeping, finally.
As much as I wished he had a proper home — for his own benefit, and given the sour smell covering his half of the compartment also for mine — I hope he gets at least an hour of deep sleep before someone kicks him out.
The other two passengers have sought shelter from the smell and sit at my end of the compartment, a series of open windows bathing us in the chilly yet fresh early-morning air. A woman in her fifties, her hijab perfectly arranged. A young man no older than twenty, his dark arms covered in tattoos. Both are wearing their airport staff uniforms. Their red eyes with dark rings beneath them, and their heads struggling to not drop onto their chests, tell the story of a long night shift. A warm sense of gratitude rises in me for all the people in the shadows who quietly keep this country humming.
I look back out the window, open my to-go-cup, close my eyes, and slowly inhale the invigorating smell: scents of fresh earth, dark chocolate, and roasted hazelnuts rise from my French press-brewed coffee. If the sunrise is nature’s daily sign of reliability, then making my coffee every morning is my personal act of defiance against all the chaos roaming the world.
As I take my first sip, my thoughts start drifting toward the workday ahead. I haven’t looked at my to-do list yet, but in last night’s dreams I have already been busy tackling it. My heart begins racing. The peace and calm of just moments ago vanish instantly.
It has happened again.
My mind has left the comfort of my weekend cave. It has entered the vast lands of the workweek. Lands of anticipation, chaos, and anxiety. Lands where rivers full of never-ending problems criss-cross the terrain in whichever way pleases them, and where one never knows when a stream will pull you under.
I feel hot. And cold. Both at the same time.
I relive last night’s dreams. What a productive worker I was in my sleep. My hands ball into fists. The hairs on my arms stand up.
It’s still another thirty minutes until I arrive at the office, but my body is already in fight mode.
I take another sip, the soothing coffee hitting my mouth. That’s all it takes to finally snap me out of my anxiety, to remind myself how ridiculous my reaction is, and to breathe deeply. As my nerves calm and breathing slows, I leave the part of me that wants to run back to bed behind, open my phone, and pretend to be the grown-up professional who is calmly preparing for his day.
Soon I’ll forget all about my anxiety, my mind at first busy with tasks, then too exhausted to contemplate anything.
But tomorrow morning, back on the 7am train, it will be waiting for me.
My reliable frenemy.
Bonus gift: for the ones of you who liked The HRP, I think you’ll enjoy this debate on whether robots should take our jobs.
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