Gracie in New York Post 4

2/12/08

Ah....bonding. It is a wonderful thing. Where once you felt like a duckling following a bunch of other ducklings, you now swim that pond like you've had oiled feathers for a lifetime instead of, ohh, six hours with the absolute certainty that you will see those ducklings again. After texting each other to make sure Keisha had arrived, we all went our merry ways, carefree yet determined to take advantage of this opportunity, especially when we found out how much one night at the Sheraton went for...even with the discount.

The first seminars for me had been great. The expectations were high for the keynote address. Unfortunately, things were a little, well; let's just say the keynote speaker spoke about everything concerning the keynote speaker.

John Irving is a fine writer, not that I should have the audacity to pass any opinion whatsoever about a writer with 12 books and 3 films under his belt. However, I was expecting more of a "from my (John Irving's) perspective, AWP is a beacon (yeah, yeah cliché) of excellence and support for all writing professionals" kind of speech. Instead, I sat through what had to be a first draft of a new book, unless it just reads aloud sluggishly, and a few anecdotes of how "you must know your ending in order to write a novel."

Granted, if I'm going to the store or BB King's restaurant, I probably should know where I'm going to end. But I am still naive enough to believe that at some point all those characters and ideas form their own energy and pretty much takes me to an ending. Now, I may rework it, revise it or ditch it all together but I don't think I knew it was coming before I wrote the first word.

Or maybe I missed his point all together. I couldn't ask him though because his posse escorted him out the side door as soon as he finished the somewhat Hollywood story of his ex-wife, her boyfriend, a law suit and a ceiling fan. So, there are no pictures of John Irving. And I realize I am taking pictures of those things I want to remember.