1. Do not wear chocolate-brown suede
boots. Although they’re gorgeous, they
won’t look that way after you’ve trudged a half-mile through a dirt parking-lot
to get from, and get back to, your automobile, OR spending a whole day whirling
like a dervish darting from book booth to book booth, searching for that elusive
golden book-calf. At the car race, you ask yourself, why is the dirt so wet in
places? At the conference, why do the eyes of the people get glassier and
glassier?
2. At a NASCAR race, you can see a
woman, out in public, in the dirt parking lot, relieving herself in full view,
save for her open vehicle door. You will never for the rest of your life forget
that image; additionally, you remain bewildered as to how much liquid one woman
can literally contain. At an AWP Conference, you can see MFA students
euphemistically emptying their bowels upon seeing the famous poet/writer of
their dreams at the lectern or sitting at the panel table, or perched upon the
hotel barstool. You cannot remember even one of their faces.
3. You now know why the dirt is wet
in the parking lot at a NASCAR race. You still cannot remember a single MFA
face.
4. Everything smells like mustard
and wet socks for the first hour of every day. Car race: French’s. Conference:
Gulden’s. Socks: not cashmere at either venue.
5. Essentially, same amount of
people. Car race: 100,000. Conference:
11,000. Big difference: writers move faster, but with unfulfilling efficiency;
race audiences, much larger width-wise, but the utilization of any deficits works
to their advantage.
6. A poet or writer would most
likely submit later to scientific testing upon their own anatomy by a mad
doctor to have an audience of 100,000 listening raptly to him/her read poetry
from his/her latest volume. A car race enthusiast drives 95 miles an hour on
the freeway just to get to the race on time, and that person is extremely happy
not to be noticed by anybody.
7. You can lose someone in a crowd
at NASCAR and you will not locate them again – ever. You can lose someone,
intentionally, in a crowd at the AWP conference – but there they are in the
elevator, or two rows up at a panel talk. Moreover, they will turn around to
look at you.
8. Liquor. Everybody in the pool.
9. You will not hear the Blues
playing anywhere at a NASCAR race. You will be able to run for your life to at
least one Blues club somewhere, within two blocks of your hotel. Memorize that
path.
10. The NASCAR drivers are protected
by a high fence and then plenty of pit security. After the race, they are in
their giant mobile homes and on the road before you’ve even gotten out of the
metal stands. If there weren’t a law against it, you could literally butt
foreheads with one famous writer/poet after another until you’ve knocked your
own self out. Or gotten so hungry that by then all you want is a nice quiet
meal. And a physician.
Bonus material:
T-shirts at a NASCAR race cost
$26.00 and other paraphernalia goes up from there in price. T-shirts at an AWP
conference cost $26.00 on the first day but by Saturday they’re practically
throwing the stuff away. At NASCAR, hope to like anybody besides Number 48, if
you’re interested in buying anything. Unless you have two hours to wait in line.
Which people do, and God bless ‘em, happily. At an AWP conference, go ahead and
like anybody of any number.
See you next year in Seattle, AWP!
NASCAR, that was plenty. And thanks!
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