A new chapter
With a book, it’s clear where it begins and ends. You open the cover and begin reading with an Introduction, or Once upon a time, which is just a different kind of introduction. And even if it doesn’t say the end, it’s clear when the book is over. There aren’t any more pages. Typically there’s a neat conclusion or a happily ever after which is not precisely an end to the story, but it’s a strong signal that now it is time for you, the reader, to leave. The book runs out of pages, there’s a back cover mirroring the front, and then you’re back on the street, blinking and looking around you.
I have never been terribly good at endings. I tend to remain steadfastly, doggedly loyal to things, people, jobs, hobbies, cities, apartments. I find myself still holding strong, trying to start up a dance party at 2 AM when it’s been clear to others for a while that the party is over, and they’ve all gone home or moved on to other things. (This is both a metaphor and a literal thing that has happened, more than once.)
And because I don’t traffic much in endings, I don’t have very much practice with beginnings, either. If you never stop doing anything you start, eventually you run out of time in your day, week, year, and you can’t add anything else to the stack.
The past two years haven’t gone to plan for me. That’s probably the understatement of this cursed decade. But even holding COVID aside, some choices I made haven’t really panned out. I found myself realizing last year that it was 2 am, and it wasn’t time for a dance party, it was time for a rest and a fresh start.
So I’ve begun to end some things. I began back in 2020 by putting down the book I had been working on about money and publishing. It did not, I decided, spark joy. Quite the opposite: I found myself dwelling in the problems of an industry I cared about during all of my free time. I had gotten a few offers to publish it, but I turned them down. I parted ways with my agent. I put the book in the metaphorical drawer.
I had already stopped playing roller derby after over a decade, but that was due to a catastrophic injury that made it deeply unwise to keep going. I stayed involved in Gotham Roller Derby, joining the board of directors before I had even fully healed. I spent the pandemic Zooming with people like Margaret Thrasher and Beatrix Slaughter, trying to solve the problems a global pandemic wrought on a contact sport run as a volunteer-led nonprofit in one of the most expensive cities in the country. 2022 marks 15 years that I’ve dedicated to roller derby, and that, for now, is enough.
And today, I’ll send my last email as a Kickstarter employee. For my first six years at the company, my job was to help writers, publishers, illustrators, comics creators, literary nonprofits, booksellers, and journalists raise funds and build community on Kickstarter. I traveled around the country and even internationally, meeting people and teaching them how to fund their art through the power of community. It was more wonderful than I could have imagined.
But as the old saying goes, if you’re good enough at something, you eventually get promoted and stop doing it. I took a promotion that meant I was no longer supporting people who made books and art, but supporting the people who supported the people who made art. And though I probably enjoy budgets and company strategy quite a lot more than the average person, ultimately it was too far removed from what really I love doing.
Ending things is very hard. I used to be a planner, a person who always knew what was next, and what was after that. But I’m realizing that there’s an intoxicating excitement to beginnings, and I’d like to learn more about them.
In a couple weeks, I’ll begin a new role with a mission-driven independent book publisher. I can’t wait to be back in the thick of things with books. COVID-permitting, I’ll be at AWP at the end of March. I hope to see you there.