Joni B. Cole - Good Naked: Reflections on How to Write More, Write Better, and Be Happier

Acknowledgments

Once I finish work on a book, I could go around thanking and hugging everybody, but effective writing is all about selectivity, so I will limit myself here to listing those people who helped me directly in this effort, whether they knew it or not. First, thank you to my editor, Richard Pult at UPNE, whose email response to my book proposal was one of the best opening lines I have ever readIm very pleased to tell you...

A special thanks to the following people: Steve Cole, who takes such great care of his family; Deborah McKew, a creative lifeline for me and so many others; Nancy Fontaine, my breakfast brainstormer and website caregiver; Becky Joffrey, a force of inspiration; and Frances McManus, for her love and light. To my clubhouse friends and fellow writersLisa Barfield, Suzanne Cot-Curtiss, Mike Humphrey, Paula Nulty, and Marjorie SaadahI want to publicly affirm that you guys are the best! And adorbz to a one.

I am also grateful to the following individuals who make me want to write, feed my love of teaching, and/or make me look smarter with their feedback and wisdom: Pam Broadley, Kendra Colburn, Lacey Colligan, Kwame Dawes, Chris Demers, Dan Deneen, Casey Dennis, Dixie Eastridge, Jennifer Falvey, Mike Fanizzi, Laura Foley, Ah-reum Han, Linda Hazard, Deborah Heimann, Alison Hine, Don Kollisch, Marjorie Matthews, Martha McLafferty, Jennifer Minotti, Sasha Mordecai, Geraldine North, Kristy OMeara, Carl Small, Abby Tassel, Ed Ting, and Sheila Tanzer.

A manuscript is not a book, and to make that transformation takes a lot of work at the publishing house, which is often left unacknowledged because, well, because the author wrote the acknowledgments before that whole process began. But I have never been a writer afraid of last-minute author alterations, so I would like to add here my thanks to the following people at University Press of New England for their talents in copyediting, design, production, marketing, publicity, and sales: Barbara Briggs, Eric Brooks, Michael Burton, Amanda Dupuis, Sara Evangelos, Katy Grabill, Andrew Lohse, Sherri Strickland, and Susan Sylvia.

My appreciation also extends to all the writers who have graced the workshops at my writers center with their stories, insights, and support of one another. I also want to thank my workshop participants in the MALS program at Dartmouth College, at the Hartford (Vermont) Community Restorative Justice Center, the Comprehensive Womens Care Center at the VA Medical Center in White River Junction, and WISE, which supported nearly 1,000 victims of domestic violence in our community in the past fiscal year alone. I am lucky to sit in your circles. Thanks, as well, to the Vermont Studio Center and the Vermont Arts Council, whose generosity allowed me two weeks of focused writing time overlooking the ice floes of the Gihon River.

P.S. Direct marketing experts advise reserving one of your most important messages for the postscript because it draws more attention, and is often read first. With that in mind, I have included here a special acknowledgment to my partner, Helmut Baer, who is my heart, my head holder, my creative collaborator, and the most fun person I know. Thank you for always being there for me.

About the Author

In work and in life, author and teacher Joni B. Cole prefers a macro lens, seeking the extraordinary in the ordinary, the significance in everyday moments. Her book Toxic Feedback: Helping Writers Survive and Thrive is strongly recommended for students and teachers by Library Journal. (I cant imagine a better guide to [writings] rewards and perils than this fine book, American Book Review.) She is the author of the personal essay collection Another Bad-Dog Book: Essays on Life, Love, and Neurotic Human Behavior (riotously funny and outrageously honest, Gina Barreca). Joni is also the creator of the three-volume This Day book series that reveals the reality of a day in the life of hundreds of women across America and from all walks of life (fascinating and eye-opening, Publishers Weekly). She founded the Writers Center of White River Junction, Vermont, serves on the faculty of the New Hampshire Institute of Art, and teaches writing workshops at the Master of Arts in Liberal Studies program at Dartmouth College. Joni also leads expressive writing workshops for a variety of educational and social services programs. She has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and a United States Artists Fellowship, and is a frequent teacher and speaker at conferences around the country. Joni lives in Vermont and has two daughters. For more information, visit www.jonibcole.com.

First Things First (Not)

You have a Great Idea for a story. You are so infatuated with this Great Idea that you gush to your friends and fellow writersIm going to write a book about [insert your Great Idea here]! Your Great Idea takes up residence in your psyche. It settles in, as entitled and undisciplined as lesser royalty. Weeks pass, then months, but nothing gets written. Your Great Idea begins to pace the shag carpet of your mind.

Whats the holdup, hon? your Great Idea asks. These shoes are killing me.

I just need a little more time, you tell your Great Idea. Im not sure how to get started.

Life continues, crowding the inside of your head with more experiences, more people, more memories, more distractions: Ticks! Whens the last time I checked myself for ticks? Still, even with so much going on in your world, you keep revisiting your Great Idea in your mind. By now, its shoes are off. Its feet rest on the coffee table of your consciousness, next to a highball sweating on the once burnished cherry tabletop. You think, Why cant it use a coaster?

I thought you loved me, your Great Idea nags. I thought you were all, like, I want to spend time with you. You mean so much to me. I want us to have a future together.

And your Great Idea is right. You did want that. You still want that. You loved your Great Idea then and you love it now, only now it is starting to feel more like a love-hate relationship because you cannot think about your Great Idea without feeling guilty. Im just too busy to sit down and write, you tell yourself, citing your dependents, the crumbs in your bread drawer, your commitment to world peace. Deep down, however, you know it is not family, or work, or even your ideal of planetary nonviolence that is keeping you away from your desk. This editorial paralysis is all about your fear of making a wrong first move. This is the real reason you cannot commit to your Great Idea.

Where to start? Where to start?

What is it with you artist types? Your Great Idea shrugs away your latest excuse, and returns its attention to the crossword. This is not a puzzle from the New York Times, you notice, but one with a picture of a TV celebrity in the center of the grid. Vanna! you hear yourself screaming. The five-letter name of a Lucky Letter Turner is Vanna. Even an imbecile knows that! But what really upsets you is how your Great Idea made air quotes when it said the word artist.

A year, then another, passes.

Whatever happened to your Great Idea? If one more friend asks you this, you will instantly unfriend them. Why cant people mind their own beeswax? You bite open your third snack pack of smoked almonds. How is this even possible, that seventeen little almonds could add up to 100 calories?

Where to start? Where to start?

Finally, maybe because your youngest is packing for his gap year in Carmel, or you read on Facebook that your high school class is planning its thirtieth reunion, or you simply cannot