Issue Two
December 2024
writers anonymous
Simon John Collinson
I’ve joined this new group recently. It's the second big step I've taken.
The first step was admitting I had a problem in the first place.
I am a writer. I can’t stop writing.
I have become a compulsive writer. A wretched writerholic.
It started off when I was young.
Both my parents were habitual writers. My dad was a poet. Mother was a journalist. I guess it was likely I’d follow them down the rocky writing path to ruin.
At school I fell in with the wrong crowd. We’d spend all our spare time in the library reading and writing. You know, scribbling things down.
Dirty limericks mainly.
But that was the gateway into the hell of prose poetry and one act plays.
Kill Your Darlings: original artwork by Anne Anthony
At Uni I wasted my time on every Creative writing course going. I drifted from one literary magazine to another. Just getting a buzz from writing stories with higher and higher word counts.
Before long I was writing pulpy crime noir romances and chasing every publisher going. It all became a blur of endless stories and pitches. I hated myself. But that didn’t stop me writing every little wretched detail of my self loathing down and sending it off to whatever publisher was interested in a person’s self disgust and abasement. Which was plenty.
Every story took me down closer to the gutter.
Until it got so bad I was researching gutters all over the place to do a story about them.
I was in denial for so long. I thought I could stop writing anytime that I liked. Or that I was just a social leisure writer. I thought I was in control of my writing habit.
All of this was rubbish.
It controlled me.
And I was writing more and more on my own.
I didn’t care what I was writing. At first it was CNF and short stories but I soon descended to writing hybrid and free form poetry, even flash. I was disgustingly dribbling drabbles all over town.
Topics? I didn’t care. I was writing all of them Horror, romance, Sci-fi. Even comedy.
I was hanging around open mic clubs doing poetry. I was reading a different poem out every night.
I was writing novelettes in my dreams.
My life outside of writing was being written out of existence.
Children, partners and friends just drifted in and out of my life without me noticing. My youngest son came pleading with me after an all night writing session. He told me,
“It's me or the book, dad.”
I didn’t even look up to reply, “Which one?” and carried on writing. Life had become a complete write out.
It got worse. I had got into the hard stuff, writing Shakesperian sonnets. By last year I was writing 12 kitchen sink gothic stories a day.
It was really sad.
In my lowest moments I resorted to writing reviews on books I knew didn’t exist. That's when I knew I had a problem. I couldn’t stop writing.
Luckily I was soon put onto this group, Writers Anonymous.
I was given a guide who looked after me every step of the way. There were moments of weakness. Where I was tempted to write. I’d see a book or a magazine, walk past the library, I'd watch a person write a letter and I'd be drooling. I would be salivating at the sight of a postcard.
But I soon broke all my pens and pencils. Even threw out my eye liner. Threw away the laptop and mobile phone.
All those writers I used to hang out with I now realise they were encouraging me to engage in harmful activity. I had to break my links with them. There was no hope for them. They were too far gone lost in their addiction. Most nights they will be down some alleyway scribbling away and sharing stories, prompting each other into writing more daringly experimental stuff.
I’m glad I’ve left that sordid life behind.
I understood now that it wasn’t big or clever to write. The teachers were right, writing would make me go blind.
So now at the WA meetings we all support one another in abstinence. To distract myself I took up smoking. Other people in the group distract themselves with drink or drugs or having lots of wild sex. I wish now I had picked that one. It seems fun. Geoff picked wild sex and he’s always smiling.
We all get to stand up and say how we’re getting on. Except for Geoff. Geoff could barely stand with all the wild sex he’s having. He told the rest of us he hadn’t written anything in ten years. I don’t think Geoff has the time or energy to write after all that sex day in and day out. My god, Geoff is looking more haggard with each passing week. But he’s still smiling.
I told them all last week that it had been seventy days since I’d written anything. They all gave me a gentle round of applause. Except for Geoff. He can barely keep his eyes open. Just sits there smiling.
I’m tempted to write about my experiences in this group or my struggle with writing addiction. That's the trouble. You think you're doing fine, but it worms its insidious way into your thoughts and before you know it you’ve got an 8 page work in progress and bragging on X how many submissions pendings you’ve got and querying like there’s no tomorrow.
You’ve got to be strong to beat this writing devil.
I’m just taking it one day at a time, not writing anything down.
P.S don’t tell anyone at the group I wrote this. That would wipe the smile off Geoff’s face.
About the author
Simon is a writer from England. He seeks solitude and shadow.
