Went to see The Bloggess (Jenny Lawson) last night at the bookstore and it was such a great event.
She was just as real and funny and honest as she is on her blog. I loved her first book, Let’s Pretend This Never Happened and this time she’s promoting the follow up, Furiously Happy: A Funny Book About Horrible Things. The second one is on my TBR pile. Haven’t read it yet but plan to soon.
It’s always interesting to go to an author event because some authors are totally different than you would picture them. The impression you get from their writing is one thing and then in person they give off a totally different vibe. But not so with The Bloggess! She was just like you’d expect, talking honestly about mental illness with humor and real emotion.
I like that she has talked so openly about this subject, and done it in such a funny, no BS way. She’s created a movement of sorts, where likeminded folks can saddle up to her blog and find a safe place to chat about things everyone else is uncomfortable with. I applaud her for that and I’m a fan.
The hubs had a great time at the event, too. We got to enjoy some Starbucks and sat with the many other people there. She packed the house.
Although those bright lights directly over our head (and my crappy camera) didn’t do us any favors. Hello red noses! It looks like we were either drunk or sunburned. We were neither, although maybe we are drunk on life and warmed by the sunshine of love.
Too much?
Another thing I like about The Bloggess is she truly has a unique voice. I see writers struggle so much with this. They don’t know how to blog or what to share or how to BE, and readers today want that. It also reminds me to keep telling your story so that the others who have experienced the same thing have another person to validate their truth. The Bloggess said last night that she isn’t everyone’s cup of tea and she is happy with that, and I totally got that. A while ago someone gave me a snarky jab about “the things I write” and it reminded me all over again how some people just don’t get it. They aren’t meant to. They don’t understand verbal abuse or alcoholism and because they’ve never experienced it. I’ve worked through things and celebrate forgiveness and have this beautiful life now, and because of that they think what I say must not be true. They don’t understand it, and that’s okay. I write for the people that do get it, and I hear from them. (From you!) That’s the lesson I got right from the start when The Difference Now was published and so many people tried to contact me even though I wasn’t that easy to find back then.
I think it helped that when I started blogging and writing I didn’t know what I was doing and was just trying to get writing jobs. I wasn’t necessarily trying to push my books although they sold as a result of the other marketing I was doing. Of course, my books aren’t as popular as Jenny Lawson’s (choke – not even close) but I think we can all learn from what she’d done and how she’s let us into her world.
P.S. You can also spot us in the picture The Bloggess took of the event. We’re back there. I sat behind an extremely tall woman but my peanut head is visible if you look.
