I love this concept. The care, craftsmanship, and what I can only call love that you put into this piece hit me in the face (in the best way). There are so many parts that I loved, but what I found most moving was the way you built up to and segued out of that one sentence about your dad that it took you a decade to formulate. I have to admit this hit me particularly hard, as something similar (though different happened to me) with my mom. Thanks for writing this. I'm very glad to have found your Substack and to catch up on the other One Words ahead of me.
It's really cool that you read Stone first. When you mentioned that you'd go back to the first word, part of me thought: "No! Read the newest newness!"
But this one I really did put a lot of time and love into. I'm glad you decided to start here. Your thoughts are appreciated to a degree I'd just stumble around if I tried to quantify it here. Means a lot, though.
Looking forward to reading more of your writing this weekend, and to our continued back and forth across Substack
The best part of Notes is that I’ve now had a number of meaningful interactions with other writers, many of whom I’d never read before. I totally understand that impulse to say please read the newest thing I’ve written, it is surely the best. When I read in your first supplement how long you’d worked on Stone though I knew I wanted to start there.
And I really appreciate you reading my writing as well! I’m hoping to post a piece soon that is sort of similar to Stone, in that it is in theory about a play I saw, but really about my mom’s illness, and also I’ve been working on it now most days for 6 weeks (so not quite Stone length, but definitely more of a sustained writing and editing cycle than is typical for me).
Totally agree with Notes. It unlocked some latent social fabric that was always there with Substack but really hard to access. Unless you combed the Writer Office Hour posts or did some digging in the explore tab you wouldn’t even know about all the communities on the platform. It’s exciting and worth taking advantage of, for sure.
I’m really looking forward to this piece. Your writing has the rare ability to make a complex idea click. I’ll also be curious, once you’ve posted it, how it felt writing in a longer editing cycle than is typical for you. There’s always something to learn about how other writers tackle challenges!
I'm really excited to see how Substack continues to grow! There are so many pockets of communities, small and large, and I really hope the Substack team keeps finding ways to link these together. For instance, you had a Note about checking your writer dashboard to see your audience overlap. Well, I wish that readers could also see their overlap with other readers. As a reader, I subscribe to 100+ Substacks, so if some other person out there shares even 20% then I bet we have a lot in common.
And thanks for the compliment! I'm excited, but also a bit anxious to post the piece I'm working on. It is by far the most personal thing I've ever published. It also goes against my normal writing process of making it through 95% of a draft in a fugue like flow state, doing a couple of re-reads to edit, and then sending it out into the world. But I've been reading George Saunders a lot recently--both here on Substack and also in his phenomenal book A Swim in a Pond in the Rain--and have really realized that if I want to do my writing justice I need to take editing seriously.
That's a really good suggestion - reader overlap in the reco tab. I'd use that all the time! You should pitch it to @substack or one of the team members (Hamish or Chris Best maybe) in a note, just to get it on their radar. Their way more open to user suggestions than a lot of software companies.
Saunders has had a big influence on me, too. I loved his book on writing - the man has a serious talent for teaching the craft. What's your favorite Saunder's story?
Editing is a big part of my process. 3 or 4 years ago, I read two books on writing that had such an emphasis on editing that it became an obsession of mine (you can definitely over-edit). They were:
Attack of the Copula Spiders - Douglas Glover
On Writing Well - William Zinsser
The Zinsser book is the one best book on writing I've ever read. He focuses on non-fiction and has such a handle on the craft that I walked away from that book in a totally different head space.
It can be hard to balance the edits with publishing pace, since there's always that invisible pressure to publish often. Glad to hear you're on that path now. No pressure but, like I said, looking forward to the piece you have coming up!
Stones - the ancient foundation of our world, impossible to forget or ignore (in my humble opinion). Thank you for your words about these magnificent beasts!
I love this concept. The care, craftsmanship, and what I can only call love that you put into this piece hit me in the face (in the best way). There are so many parts that I loved, but what I found most moving was the way you built up to and segued out of that one sentence about your dad that it took you a decade to formulate. I have to admit this hit me particularly hard, as something similar (though different happened to me) with my mom. Thanks for writing this. I'm very glad to have found your Substack and to catch up on the other One Words ahead of me.
Hey Spencer,
It's really cool that you read Stone first. When you mentioned that you'd go back to the first word, part of me thought: "No! Read the newest newness!"
But this one I really did put a lot of time and love into. I'm glad you decided to start here. Your thoughts are appreciated to a degree I'd just stumble around if I tried to quantify it here. Means a lot, though.
Looking forward to reading more of your writing this weekend, and to our continued back and forth across Substack
The best part of Notes is that I’ve now had a number of meaningful interactions with other writers, many of whom I’d never read before. I totally understand that impulse to say please read the newest thing I’ve written, it is surely the best. When I read in your first supplement how long you’d worked on Stone though I knew I wanted to start there.
And I really appreciate you reading my writing as well! I’m hoping to post a piece soon that is sort of similar to Stone, in that it is in theory about a play I saw, but really about my mom’s illness, and also I’ve been working on it now most days for 6 weeks (so not quite Stone length, but definitely more of a sustained writing and editing cycle than is typical for me).
Totally agree with Notes. It unlocked some latent social fabric that was always there with Substack but really hard to access. Unless you combed the Writer Office Hour posts or did some digging in the explore tab you wouldn’t even know about all the communities on the platform. It’s exciting and worth taking advantage of, for sure.
I’m really looking forward to this piece. Your writing has the rare ability to make a complex idea click. I’ll also be curious, once you’ve posted it, how it felt writing in a longer editing cycle than is typical for you. There’s always something to learn about how other writers tackle challenges!
I'm really excited to see how Substack continues to grow! There are so many pockets of communities, small and large, and I really hope the Substack team keeps finding ways to link these together. For instance, you had a Note about checking your writer dashboard to see your audience overlap. Well, I wish that readers could also see their overlap with other readers. As a reader, I subscribe to 100+ Substacks, so if some other person out there shares even 20% then I bet we have a lot in common.
And thanks for the compliment! I'm excited, but also a bit anxious to post the piece I'm working on. It is by far the most personal thing I've ever published. It also goes against my normal writing process of making it through 95% of a draft in a fugue like flow state, doing a couple of re-reads to edit, and then sending it out into the world. But I've been reading George Saunders a lot recently--both here on Substack and also in his phenomenal book A Swim in a Pond in the Rain--and have really realized that if I want to do my writing justice I need to take editing seriously.
That's a really good suggestion - reader overlap in the reco tab. I'd use that all the time! You should pitch it to @substack or one of the team members (Hamish or Chris Best maybe) in a note, just to get it on their radar. Their way more open to user suggestions than a lot of software companies.
Saunders has had a big influence on me, too. I loved his book on writing - the man has a serious talent for teaching the craft. What's your favorite Saunder's story?
Editing is a big part of my process. 3 or 4 years ago, I read two books on writing that had such an emphasis on editing that it became an obsession of mine (you can definitely over-edit). They were:
Attack of the Copula Spiders - Douglas Glover
On Writing Well - William Zinsser
The Zinsser book is the one best book on writing I've ever read. He focuses on non-fiction and has such a handle on the craft that I walked away from that book in a totally different head space.
It can be hard to balance the edits with publishing pace, since there's always that invisible pressure to publish often. Glad to hear you're on that path now. No pressure but, like I said, looking forward to the piece you have coming up!
Stones - the ancient foundation of our world, impossible to forget or ignore (in my humble opinion). Thank you for your words about these magnificent beasts!
What a great way to phrase their presence on this planet. We’ll done and thank you!
Wow. You actually made me care a bit more about rocks and stone. Hehe
This is beautifully written, man. WELL DONE.
Hey! Thanks a lot Christian