Sisterhood of sex columnists

There's no manual on "how to be a sex columnist." There's no format or formula to follow, little instruction, and you're kindof just on your own, winging it, hoping you have something original and interesting to say. I don't want such a manual but sometimes, it still feels very much like winging it. I have ideas galore, but it takes a real core of strength to believe you can even do this, to not secondguess yourself to the point of giving up, to really go there, to the sometimes uncomfortable or exposing places, ones that make sense to you but may not make sense to others. You have to basically tune out all the hype, all the haters and the fans, for a little while to figure out what's inside, what you feel like, not what you should feel like. You have to resist the urge to be somehow different - sluttier, more worldly, more knowledgeable, more XXX, more whatever - and figure out what you want to say and what makes sense for you at that moment.

Since I started writing the Lusty Lady column for The Village Voice, I haven't run out of ideas, but it hasn't always been easy. I have been heartened to have the support and friendship of so many other sex writers and to continue to do so. I don't see this as a competitive game; if we each have something interesting to bring to the conversation, I'm all for it. I love reading columns and writing by Tristan Taormino, Miriam Datskovsky, Em and Lo, Diana Cage, etc. I'm honored to know people like Lily Burana, Lisa Palac, and Susie Bright, and to have their support and encouragement is such a gift to me - these are people I've been reading for many years, whose work I return to again and again, who I've looked up to. At the same time, it's scary for me. It's easy to look up to people, to idolize them, to "want to be them," to worship them in the way some of us do with our favorite writers. There's this line in Mary Lou Lord's "The Bridge" that goes "and whatever happens to dreams/when they become reality." I'm not Kurt Cobain (who it's at least a very good guess that song was written about), but I get it. For some of us, success is fucking scary. It's why that Marianne Williamson quote is so powerful. It's like we want it so badly, more than anything, yet the closer we get, the more it feels safer, easier, cozier to stay where you are.

I was talking to another writer friend about this. "Success," or at least, widespread readership, does mean that it's not just your friends reading. It means people will disagree, stereotype, hate, judge. It means people will think things about you that very likely you'll never change. It forces you to grow up, to really figure out what you mean and what you don't, to not take even a single word for granted, because especially in this blogalicious day and age, it'll get picked apart. It's not fun, and maybe not healthy to read it all, but I do. Because I learn from it, and it makes me appreciate the people in my life, writers and non-writers, who just get me, who get it, who get the writer me, and the sitting around eating cupcakes laughing my head off me.

And that's why this post by AM NY dating columnist Julia Allison made me so happy. I feel like there's this self-imposed exile some writers have, or you hear about someone and think "oh, she's ___" or whatever it is (I just mean generally) and never reach out to them because of some perceived persona or competition factor or whatever, and that's a shame. I'm so honored to have met Miriam and Elise Nersesian during our New York magazine dinner, to have befriended Jessica Cutler and Judy McGuire (and have them gross us all out at my reading series), to trade emails with Mindy Friedman, who writes the Sex on Tuesday column for my alma mater's paper, The Daily Cal.

I would hope that there's somewhat of a sisterhood of sex columnists, and if there's not, we have to create one. That doesn't mean we have to like or agree with everything everyone else writes, but let's face it - it's a better "story" if there are catfights going on left in right, girls trying to outfuck one another on the page. I'm just not about that in any way, and while I can certainly state when I don't agree with something or someone, I'd much rather focus my energies on the good. It's why I continue doing Gothamist interviews, why I try to plug books and projects here that I think are worthwhile, why I feel like, as much as I want to succeed, I want everyone else I know who's talented to succeed too.

Writing is a really lonely business. Maybe you have an agent, maybe you have a few people who get it, totally. But I'm very gunshy. I hate showing people my writing. I'll pitch or mail things off to editors, but show it to a writing group? I freak out, petrified they'll eviscerate every word. Yes, it's true. Sometimes I know I'm done, know a piece worked, and sometimes, I hate it, and still hate it when I turn it in or, worse, never turn it in because I just am overcome by paralysis, fear, and doubt. So having friends who do what I do, who just get it, no questions asked, is a blessing, and one I'm really careful never to take for granted.

And speaking of sex columnists, be on the lookout this fall/winter (probably October or November) for an In The Flesh entitled "Revenge of the Sex Columnists." I don't know exactly what that will entail, but watch your backs.