Anyone know the derivation of Tawdry?
AKA What not to do when someone tells you your writing is awful
“Are you writing?” my husband asks me, serving himself food from the fridge. I huff dramatically before answering.
“Trying”. I say, washing the resignation in my throat down with another sip of red wine.
I tap at the keyboard. Attacking it with only two fingers. Before deleting with equal rabid energy.
I start. Stop. Change direction. Refill my glass. Search online for sofas I can’t afford. Turn the radio down. Begin again.
I’m in a hinterland, I think to myself. The Didcot Parkway of writing. Caught between having so much to say and nothing at all. Wondering why on earth the world needs more blathering on, (specifically about oneself). Ahem.
This feels like the right time to mention the email I received.
It was late evening. I had the bedroom side light on. Rummaging for pyjamas in that draw that really needs reorganising. My phone flashed. I glanced down. Gmail. A name I recognised. A relative, one not seen in over twenty years. I opened my inbox to a message as short and sharp as a papercut.
“Emily. I came across your Substack”.
(I’d switched it from private to public for all of 15 hours. Insert eye roll emoji).
“Will you stop, for god’s sake, writing such tawdry nonsense”.
I had to Google tawdry. Just to be sure I knew what it meant. You can do it too if you like.
(Who needs an inner critic when you have long lost family, eh?)
Anyway. It got me thinking. In fragments. Because, kids.
And that thought was this:
She’s Right.
I kicked the foot of bed, felt like I might be sick, then stuffed the hurt and a Nytol both firmly down my gullet and tried to sleep.
I got up the next day and attempted to forget about it. I went to my dad’s funeral. I went back to work. I went back to normal life. And I stopped writing.
I decided in fact I need not ever write again. What is point. Waste of time. What a mess. Etc.
It felt odd at first. And then actually a relief. One less thing to do! I can now eat gherkins from the jar to heart’s content. With all that not writing I wasn’t doing I had further time for Instagram and self-loathing.
The problem was, I soon realised, that half the writing I do, is actually in my head. Not haikus in the shower exactly. But stories taking shape, constantly, vividly, beautifully.
This wouldn’t do, I told myself. To fully commit to not writing, you need to not even think about writing. You need to start thinking about Other Things. You need to become a florist maybe. Or at least do more squats.
And that turned out to be possible too (the not thinking about writing, not the squats). All I had to do to stop writing in my head was watch more TV. Buy stuff I don’t need on the internet. Send myself down internet wormholes.
It was nice at first. In honesty. Slobbing my way through the weeks. But soon my eye began to twitch with all the junk pressing on it that was sitting there unsorted in my overstuffed brain.
My thoughts had stopped swooping and soaring. They now only went one way. Bending around corners was impossible. Instead, they hit dead ends. My vision blunted. My thoughts became limited. Angry. Bleak. Grey. Done. Binary. Who cares anyway. I stomped around the house moaning about the skirting boards. Useless. Upset. Seething.
And now here I am. Almost two months later.
Reluctantly. (Because rogue relatives with vicious words cut deep). But magnetically drawn back to the wretched page. Stuck on the proverbial platform of Didcot effing Parkway.
And so I’m sitting at my kitchen table, with a wine. (And I know we’re all supposed to not be drinking now, but sometimes it helps to loosen up the lock down in my head). And tonight, it’s let me luxuriously have a new thought.
And the thought is: What if she’s just a dick?
Oh.
What if we choose not to take advice from people we’d never go to for it? What if we put the same energy of chastising ourselves for not being better into quietly doing the very thing we’ve been told not to.
(Disclaimer. The child in me wants to also tattoo tawdry on one’s forehead, just for kicks, too).
My thoughts remain disjointed. (Summer holidays, etc). But if I’ve learnt anything from my kids this six weeks stretch it’s not to listen when some tired old hag tells you they know better.
And so my fingers tap, tap, tap, delete, tap.
I pour another inch of wine. And stare at the screen, allowing thoughts to connect, slowly but surely, like locomotives chugging heavily out of Didcot Parkway.
Chug, chug, chug, tap, tap, tap.
She’s right, I laugh, as I write another paragraph of absolute tosh. My writing is tawdry. Hurrah for tawdry! And also hurrah for the words that clearly also stop me from falling off the tracks. (The train metaphor, like me, will go to bed soon).
My husband has eaten his fridge dinner now. And appears to have given up on me joining him to watch a film. He’s fussing by the sink, making mint tea:
“Right, I’m off to bed, you still writing?” He yawns.
I watch him reach for the light switch, finger hovering on the hallway dimmer, paused, waiting for my response.
I raise my two typing fingers above the keyboard and smile, showing all my straight white, (only slightly red wine-stained) teeth.
“Yes” I nod. “I’m still writing”.
I'd like an Open Return to Didcot Parkway pls. Your tawdry train of thought is one of the best I know. Keep writing.
She clearly hasn't read JK Rowling. The most successful writers on the planet are tawdry as fuck. Divorce the hag and don't. stop. writing.