The Accidental Writer
July 2011
© Adam Granger
When people ask me what I do, I tell them I'm a musician and teacher, but I don't think to mention that I'm also a writer. This omission may be a reflection of the sporadic nature of my writing: my professional life flits from recording to performing to giving guitar lessons to emceeing, and in the gaps I write. Yeah, I write, but not like real writers write. They've got their writer's shacks and their nooks at the local brasserie and they consult thesauri and create outlines and they're always writing, and next to them I feel like a lightweight. (I am particularly impressed by Big Book writers: keeping plot lines and continuity intact through 400 pages is awe-inspiring in my, well, book.)
But while I don't consider myself a writer in the Dostoyevskian sense, it turns out that I've done a surprising amount of writing in my life—mostly humorous and music-related—across a wide spectrum: 200 music columns, 300 comedy scripts, 6 original albums, CD reviews and liner notes, a few roasts, some April Fool's pieces for the Bugle, and so on.
From this olio, I've plucked two of my more unusual writing experiences to describe, with Big Truths (BTs) revealed about each:
In the 90s, I wrote greeting cards, coffee mugs, and T-shirts for a company called Recycled Paper Products. There are four BTs in the card biz:
1: 85% of cards are bought by women. A punchline for a Recycled card, then, can be off-color, but only if it's really funny.
2: You write six months ahead of schedule: Christmas cards in July, graduation cards in November.
3: The most obvious jokes and punchlines have already been used. And why wouldn't they have been? Put 500 greeting card-writing monkeys in front of 500 typewriters. . . .
4: You have to curb your enthusiasm when you see your stuff in public: At a restaurant, our server was wearing one of “my” T-shirts. It had the brown and green Gucci stripes and “Gucci Gucci Goo” written on it. I said to her, “I wrote your T-shirt,” and she gave me a look that could have withered alabaster. I don't think she believed me.
I've written sporadically for and with Garrison Keillor since I played in his house band in the 70s. Writing for Garrison is hit and miss, and his editing always significantly improves my original. I wrote the material for two of the shows I guest-hosted back in the early days, plus, over the years, a few Jack's, Bertha's Kitty Boutique, and Guy Noir spots. My favorite submission was Farm Shui, about a failing farmer who, after repositioning his crops and outbuildings, has a record yield. BT1 when writing for A Prairie Home Companion: Throw plenty of sound effects into the script; Garrison doesn't want the two best sound effects guys in the business sitting on their mouths.
Occasionally, I'll write songs to order for Garrison. He called me a few years back and asked if I had any good Halloween songs for the PHC. I said, “Funny you'd ask; I was just putting the finishing touches on a couple,” and then I hung up and wrote them. BT2: Chronological legerdemain is allowed, as long as the end product is good and is before deadline. The better of my two songs was I'm Hopin', about a man's search for his body, which has walked away from him. (His friends all think he ought to quit while he's a head.)
BT3 when writing for Garrison: make him the straight man and give everyone else the laugh lines. Don't believe me? Listen to any Prairie Home Companion script.
Writing with Garrison is actually more like watching him write. His speed is terrifying. Rewind six years: I'm sitting across from him at his big round dining room table rewriting Mother's Day songs. Our first victim is a lovely old ballad called Rocking Alone in an Old Rocking Chair. I get the first shot off, with the alternate title and refrain: Driving around in a Big SUV. While I'm reloading, Garrison pretty much finishes the song. Okay, on to song two, The Sweetest Gift, a Mother's Smile. Straight away, he suggests a verse about Kenneth Lay's mother losing all of her TIAA-CREF funds and subsequently refusing to visit her son in jail. I'm on it: I shoot my cuffs and lick my pencil tip—and Keillor's done. BT4: When writing with Garrison, just doodle on your paper and nod thoughtfully every thirty seconds.
So there are two examples of what can happen to a writer's life when its owner isn't paying attention. Let's let a quote from Garrison provide the final Big Truth: “You're never done rewriting.” To which I add the obvious: Until deadline.
But while I don't consider myself a writer in the Dostoyevskian sense, it turns out that I've done a surprising amount of writing in my life—mostly humorous and music-related—across a wide spectrum: 200 music columns, 300 comedy scripts, 6 original albums, CD reviews and liner notes, a few roasts, some April Fool's pieces for the Bugle, and so on.
From this olio, I've plucked two of my more unusual writing experiences to describe, with Big Truths (BTs) revealed about each:
In the 90s, I wrote greeting cards, coffee mugs, and T-shirts for a company called Recycled Paper Products. There are four BTs in the card biz:
1: 85% of cards are bought by women. A punchline for a Recycled card, then, can be off-color, but only if it's really funny.
2: You write six months ahead of schedule: Christmas cards in July, graduation cards in November.
3: The most obvious jokes and punchlines have already been used. And why wouldn't they have been? Put 500 greeting card-writing monkeys in front of 500 typewriters. . . .
4: You have to curb your enthusiasm when you see your stuff in public: At a restaurant, our server was wearing one of “my” T-shirts. It had the brown and green Gucci stripes and “Gucci Gucci Goo” written on it. I said to her, “I wrote your T-shirt,” and she gave me a look that could have withered alabaster. I don't think she believed me.
I've written sporadically for and with Garrison Keillor since I played in his house band in the 70s. Writing for Garrison is hit and miss, and his editing always significantly improves my original. I wrote the material for two of the shows I guest-hosted back in the early days, plus, over the years, a few Jack's, Bertha's Kitty Boutique, and Guy Noir spots. My favorite submission was Farm Shui, about a failing farmer who, after repositioning his crops and outbuildings, has a record yield. BT1 when writing for A Prairie Home Companion: Throw plenty of sound effects into the script; Garrison doesn't want the two best sound effects guys in the business sitting on their mouths.
Occasionally, I'll write songs to order for Garrison. He called me a few years back and asked if I had any good Halloween songs for the PHC. I said, “Funny you'd ask; I was just putting the finishing touches on a couple,” and then I hung up and wrote them. BT2: Chronological legerdemain is allowed, as long as the end product is good and is before deadline. The better of my two songs was I'm Hopin', about a man's search for his body, which has walked away from him. (His friends all think he ought to quit while he's a head.)
BT3 when writing for Garrison: make him the straight man and give everyone else the laugh lines. Don't believe me? Listen to any Prairie Home Companion script.
Writing with Garrison is actually more like watching him write. His speed is terrifying. Rewind six years: I'm sitting across from him at his big round dining room table rewriting Mother's Day songs. Our first victim is a lovely old ballad called Rocking Alone in an Old Rocking Chair. I get the first shot off, with the alternate title and refrain: Driving around in a Big SUV. While I'm reloading, Garrison pretty much finishes the song. Okay, on to song two, The Sweetest Gift, a Mother's Smile. Straight away, he suggests a verse about Kenneth Lay's mother losing all of her TIAA-CREF funds and subsequently refusing to visit her son in jail. I'm on it: I shoot my cuffs and lick my pencil tip—and Keillor's done. BT4: When writing with Garrison, just doodle on your paper and nod thoughtfully every thirty seconds.
So there are two examples of what can happen to a writer's life when its owner isn't paying attention. Let's let a quote from Garrison provide the final Big Truth: “You're never done rewriting.” To which I add the obvious: Until deadline.
