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Episode 508: Motivated by Slights and Play Fighting in Our Underwear with Alison Lyn Miller
0 Playsin 9 hours
"I spent several months trying to narrow down the cast. I had access to so many people with interesting stories. But what [my agent] said to me over and over again was, 'narrative arc, narrative arc,' all the time. What he needed to know in order to sell the book was like, 'Where does this book start? And if you can't tell me where it ends, at least tell me what are the ups and downs? What's gonna happen along the way?" says Alison Lyn Miller, author of Rough House: A Father, a Son, and the Pursuit of Pro Wrestling Glory (Norton).
Who is our guest this week? It would appear to be Alison Lyn Miller (@alisonlynmiller on IG), author of Rough House: A Father, a Son and the Pursuit of Pro Wrestling Glory. It’s published by Norton.
This is a great book and it’s an immersive story in an oddball subculture of amateur professional wrestling. It follows Hunter James, a young man who eschewed the traditional path, the path his father wanted for him, to pursue this dream of becoming the next superstar of the WWE. You’re gonna think I’m crazy, but this book has so many parallels to being a writer. The luck you need, the timing you need, the skill you need, the perseverance you need, the envy they feel, the subjectivity, voice, style, individuality. But we writers rarely need the abs. But don’t we all want the abs.
So Alison is a freelance journalist based out of Georgia, which put her in direct overlap with this subculture of “backyarders,” these aspirational wrestlers and hobby wrestlers. It’s easy to poke fun at wrestling as fake. Well, it isn’t fake, so much as it’s scripted brutality. It’s danger adjacent, though there’s always physical risk when jumping, flipping, and kicking. Alison witnessed it all and delivers a heartfelt tale of ambition and striving, of a blind belief in the self.
In this conversation, we talk about:
- Not being able to throw everything in the book
- Being motivated by slights
- Finding the narrative arc
- The year it took Alison to write her proposal
- How wrestling mirrors humanity
- Making the writing approachable
- And maybe we should all be play fighting in our underwear
Newsletter: Rage Against the Algorithm
Show notes: brendanomeara.com
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Transcript
Introduction & Sponsorship
00:00:02
Speaker
ACN Efforts, this podcast is sponsored by the Newsletter Pitch Club, a monthly sub-stack where you read cold pitches and hear the authors audio-annotate their thinking behind how they sold and crafted these pitches that landed publication and riches beyond.
00:00:18
Speaker
The imagination, how to pitch an agent, an editor, a feature, an essay, so many more things coming down
The Art of Pitching in Freelance Writing
00:00:25
Speaker
the pipe. Just hearing how these people work through the selling of our stories, which is the crux of freelance journalism, freelance writing. Welcome to pitchclub.substack.com. Forever free.
00:00:37
Speaker
Read a little, listen a little, learn a lot. We should all be play fighting in our underwear, you know?
Welcome to Creative Nonfiction Podcast
00:00:50
Speaker
C-Mapers. It's the Creative Nonfiction Podcast, the show where I speak with tellers of true tales about the true tales they tell. Been at it since 2013. We're the longest-running podcast of our kind. We're still doing it.
00:01:01
Speaker
We are doing it, man. We ain't stopping for no one. No one. I'm Brendan O'Mara, the voice of a generation.
Exploring Wrestling with Alison Lynn Miller
00:01:08
Speaker
Who's our guest this week, Kevin? It would appear to be Alison Lynn Miller, a nice author of Rough House, A Father, A Son, and the Pursuit of Pro Wrestling Glorias, published by Norton.
00:01:21
Speaker
It's a great book, and it's an immersive story in an oddball subculture of amateur professional wrestling. It follows Hunter James, a young man who eschewed the traditional path, the path his father wanted for him to pursue this dream of becoming the next superstar of the WWE. wwe You're going to think I'm crazy, but this book has so many parallels to being a writer. The luck you need, the timing you need, the skill you need, the perseverance you need, the envy they feel, the subjectivity, voice, style, individuality.
00:01:56
Speaker
But we writers, rarely do we need the
Host's Newsletters and Social Media
00:01:59
Speaker
abs. But don't we all want the abs? Show notes to this episode more at brendanamero.com. Hey, where you can read blog posts and sign up for my two, count them, two.
00:02:10
Speaker
newsletters The Rage Against the Algorithm flagship newsletter and Pitch Club over at welcometopitchclub.slipstack.com. The show can also be found on Instagram bo at Creative Nonfiction Podcast. If you want to help the show, you can sign up to be a patron.
Supporting the Podcast
00:02:27
Speaker
Patron. a patron at patreon.com slash cnfpod. Any paid tier gets you access to the Flash 52 sessions. 52 weeks of writing Flash essays in community.
00:02:39
Speaker
It's been really fun so far. Good feedback. We have a nice little cohort that i has been gathering. No limit on that cohort. Join in anytime. Just ah fork over. you Give me that credit card, man. If you don't want to part with your beer money, leaving kind ratings and reviews of the podcast and or the front runner cost you nothing but a few minutes of your time.
00:03:01
Speaker
But those reviews and stuff, they're a vote in favor of what it is I do. Makes me more attractive to publishers. and that's how it can really get paid. ah What is it I do?
00:03:12
Speaker
I don't know. Beats me. But you can support whatever. All of this is.
Alison's Book on Wrestling
00:03:17
Speaker
So Allison is a freelance journalist based out of Georgia, which put her in direct overlap with this subculture of backyarders, these aspirational wrestlers and hobby wrestlers.
00:03:29
Speaker
Now, it's easy to poke fun at wrestling as fake. Well, it isn't fake so much as it is scripted. Scripted brutality. It's danger adjacent, though there's always physical risk when jumping and flipping and kicking.
00:03:43
Speaker
Allison witnessed it all and delivers a heartfelt tale of ambition and striving and a blind belief in the self. In this conversation, we talk about not being able to throw everything
Writing Challenges & Motivations
00:03:58
Speaker
into the book. Though it's always there.
00:04:00
Speaker
Being motivated by slights. Finding the narrative arc. The year it took Allison to write her proposal. How wrestling mirrors humanity. Making the writing approachable.
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Speaker
And maybe we should all be play fighting in our underwear. You can find Allison at AllisonLynnMiller.com. That's Allison with one L. And on Instagram, at AllisonLynnMiller.
00:04:24
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Her work has appeared in Sports Illustrated, The Washington Post, and
Alison's Background and Authority
00:04:28
Speaker
Gardening Gun, among others. She has an MFA narrative nonfiction from the University of Georgia's Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication. Man, that was a mouthful. Rough House is her first book.
00:04:42
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Parting shot on a practice I call Deadbolting. And I'm doing something new with the parting shot. Who knows how long it'll stick. I'm recording it kind of as a vlog for YouTube. I bought this set of Bluetooth wireless lav microphones for live podcasts and better audio for video.
00:05:02
Speaker
And I'm going to try to add a little spice to the CNF pod expanded universe. Maybe it goes to Patreon first.
Expanding the CNF Pod Universe
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Speaker
I don't know. Then kicks over to YouTube. Who knows? Nothing fancy. As it'll just be me reading my parting shot script and maybe adding in some special sauce here and there. Maybe some B-roll.
00:05:21
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Maybe your mom. Riff.
00:05:30
Speaker
Don't, don't ask this question. Don't go there. if structure should be as simple as it possibly can be. I think email is like the death of all all
Influences on Alison's Writing Style
00:05:40
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creativity. This is going to have to interest somebody somewhere other than me.
00:05:54
Speaker
you like what are some really great craft books that that you love maybe you revisit uh that really help sharpen your saw your tools yeah ah you know we when i was in the mfa program at georgia we read couple of uh different craft books and i'm trying to remember which one i like the best um you know to be honest I always learned more from reading nonfiction books, the the book itself, right? Sure, yeah. Another thing we did in the program was to, um you know, as we were reading nonfiction books, we we read them as students in addition
Authenticity in Writing
00:06:36
Speaker
to writers. You know, i learned how to read books as a writer better through that program. And one one book that I'm thinking of right now is called The Last Fine Time. It's by...
00:06:49
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Verlin Klinkenborg, which I'm saying that wrong, but you know, you know, I'm talking about. yeah It's not a craft book, but I just, it really stuck with me. That book is, it's about a bar in Buffalo, New York. um My parents were from the Buffalo area. So maybe that's why it struck a chord, but I think really it was about, it transported you to a place and a time. And it was about ordinary people.
00:07:13
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But it it just was so impactful in the way it was written that, you you know, that made you care about them and made you care about the places that they cared about and kind of and it made you understand something about a community in a geographic place. And I think that is kind of what I tried to do with Rough House.
Finding a Writing Voice
00:07:31
Speaker
now that I'm saying it out loud. yeah Yeah. Well, it's it's a great point to underscore that the best books on writing aren't necessarily craft books. They are just books you deeply admire that you revisit over and over again. Like I would say an up and coming director or even established directors, they don't ah read or watch, let's say, instructional videos on how to make movies. They just watch a lot of movies and they just interrogate everything, right? Right. Yeah. Another book that comes to mind that I, you know, just had covered in post-its and pencil marks was John Branch's The Last Cowboys.
00:08:09
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And that's about a rodeo family. Pretty sure
Cultural Significance of Wrestling
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Speaker
they're in Wyoming. It's been a while since I read it. John Branch is, of course, the New York Times sports writer, but he's one of those sports writers that he's not really covering what happened in the game. he's cut he's He writes about people.
00:08:24
Speaker
whose lives are intertwined with sport. But it's another one that was, you know, a family that you would have never known about or encountered ever. And and they were kind of at this pivotal point in their careers as ranchers and and rodeo performers. um And the book is called Last Cowboys because it's kind of like so important to their family. And and the the the friction is kind of letting go of that and moving forward and do they want to do that and how are they going to do that and how is that going to change their identity?
Interview Process & Authenticity
00:08:55
Speaker
when I was listening to know an interview on sports radio several months ago at this point um with the Hall of Fame offensive tackle, this guy, Joe Thomas. Yeah. And when he got to the the pros, you know, they any young athlete gets to the pros on like sheer force of will and physicality. But eventually they have to learn how to study and learn how to so watch a film because that's what takes the great like the goods to the great is that that element of study. And ah you kind of mentioned it ah a moment ago, how when you were in this MFA program, you started to read more like a writer. And so what does your film study look like when you're cracking open a book to really interrogate that text?
00:09:37
Speaker
I guess it's twofold because I just, I love reading nonfiction as a nonfiction writer. So to me, it's also entertaining. It's delightful. But i look at not only the structure of the entire book, but sentence structure. I learned a lot about writing scene from reading nonfiction books. You know, a lot of time as a nonfiction writer, so many books are, so many nonfiction books are about things that happened a long, long time ago, yet they read as though the writer was in the room. And that is because great nonfiction writers are
00:10:15
Speaker
Tenacious reporters and they're recreating scenes based on all these different pieces of information that they've that they've acquired. And so I learned not only about recreating scene, but for my
Reporting Challenges & Creative Process
00:10:26
Speaker
book, a lot of the times I was in the room.
00:10:29
Speaker
Reading great nonfiction books helped educate me on what to what to look for. And you can never, the most frustrating thing about being in a room as a reporter is like, oh, of course something's happening over there and you're standing here and you know you're just constantly missing stuff or you feel like you do. but um But putting it all together in a way that makes people visualize it, I think is takes practice and and you can learn a lot from reading.
00:10:57
Speaker
It's so hard ah yeah to to change the camera angle you know in yeah and reporting because it's great that you had you know with Ruff House that you could actually be present, but you can only be in this one area. But if something cool is happening across the room, you're going to have to maybe, i don't know, try to seek someone out that might have been a closer eyewitness or something. and Or even historical recreation, it's just like, all right, you got to find maybe other people who maybe were in the stands or different newspaper accounts who are seeing it differently. It's a It's kind of the fun, but it's also a really big challenge.
Hunter James: A Wrestler's Story
00:11:29
Speaker
Yeah. one One scene in Rough House comes to mind, which is my main character, a young wrestler named Hunter James. He's on the very lowest kind of rung of a ladder that he hopes to climb to the top, which would be WWE, But he had he's had a couple opportunities to perform on some of these bigger shows as an extra, what they call talent enhancement. So he got to be on Raw once and SmackDown. And of course I couldn't go, i wanted to go with him.
00:12:02
Speaker
Trust me, I asked if I could go with him, but um you know, he it says this is also his career, you know, and I don't think he he wasn't allowed to bring someone like me in there. You know, this industry is very secretive, which I understood. So I had him, you know, recreate that morning from the time he woke up, you know, And so it's not just like, okay, what'd you have for breakfast?
00:12:26
Speaker
Eggs. Okay. That's not enough. How did you cook the eggs? What did you have with the eggs? What did you have to drink? What brand of of energy drink? What color was the cooler that you packed? um What gas station did you stop at to change into your gear? So it's, especially with people that aren't used to being interviewed and you're, you know, I'm asking him all these just just really micro questions.
00:12:51
Speaker
And I think when you do that, people are a little bit like, what why why are what do you care? you know and um but So what you do is you say, i I wasn't there and i this is an important scene and I'm going to rec recreate it in the book. and then And then it's like, oh, okay.
00:13:06
Speaker
Okay, yes, it was Monster Energy you Drink. When you're interviewing ah for that, how how would you characterize, you know, just the way you approach you know interviewing for, be it for scene or information, the stuff that ah helps round out, round out character, round out narrative.
00:13:25
Speaker
Yeah. um ah You know, I was just thinking about Seth Wickersham's interview with you and he's like, I hate when people say you're having a conversation when you're having an interview because you're not, you're you're there for a reason. and when he said that, I was like,
00:13:40
Speaker
I kind of feel like I'm having conversations. And then for me, I, part of being able to write this book was gaining access to a community and building trust. So I did have a lot of conversations and some of that was just to get to know people and for them to get to know
Confidence in Writing
00:13:57
Speaker
me.
00:13:57
Speaker
So I think for, for that, it was um you know, that was sort of gathering information, basic information, and then And then people will start to tell you stories and then you hear a story and then you want to dig into that. So it's like you kind of have to pop make these veering off moments.
00:14:16
Speaker
And then later down the line, when you're working on putting it all together, got to go back and then kind of we're circling back to what we were just talking about is someone may have mentioned something, an anecdote.
00:14:29
Speaker
And then as you're writing the book, you realize, oh, wait, that's actually... important. Like we need to, I need to hear more about that. So it was just constant, constant conversations. I, I tried to figure out how many hours of, um, interviews and, and observation I had. I just, I don't know. It's many, many hundreds of hours.
00:14:50
Speaker
I would say it more than a hundred interviews for sure with various people, not just the people that ended up being the main characters of the book. and And anyone who who writes this way knows that so much of what you gather doesn't even end up in the book.
00:15:07
Speaker
But it also, it's it's not ah wasted. it's All those interviews helped me understand the community and and be able to write confidently about it.
00:15:19
Speaker
ah similarly when I was writing the front runner and reporting the front runner, you know very few people of the hundreds I talked to and the thousands of articles I read and all that stuff, like very few really got on the record in the book in a substantial way.
00:15:34
Speaker
But to your point, it was, none of it was wasted because it was all foundational and starting to build, build the world to be able to write confidently, like you said. And it's like, none of the that information was wasted and,
00:15:48
Speaker
Sometimes it does feel crummy that you can't get them into the book and kind of like honor their time by having them in the text. But, you know, they're there even if they're not there.
00:16:00
Speaker
Yeah. And that that i I feel that with this book, because I I spent five years. Let's see. Let's get the math right. The the the opening scene of the book is in November of 2019. The book comes out in January of 2026. So that's the duration in which I've been working on it.
00:16:20
Speaker
um And it wasn't every hour for every day for all those years. But but you're right. I mean, I talked to so many people and and part of writing a book like this that has a narrative arc is finding a lead character, someone that can carry the story and be the the guide for the reader that can kind of take the reader's hand and take them into some of these spaces. So you're not only rooting for the character or growing frustrated with the character or you know, laughing at the character, you're, you're following them into the places that, um,
00:16:53
Speaker
That tell this, tell the broader story. Yeah. Treating with characters with like, you know, care and sensitivity and respect is, is really important, especially when you're in a, in a world of, you know, professional wrestling, which is, has a reputation of just being like goofy and and fake and over the top of what. But it's the people who take it seriously, it's it's a very, I mean, ah these people are incredibly athletic and ah tremendous performers, but it's easy it's easy to poke fun at.
00:17:24
Speaker
And you never get that sense from you. Like you really honored their their place in this world without taking jabs at it.
Wrestling's Moral Themes
00:17:34
Speaker
Yeah. And and and i I think back to my very first interview, kind of like my entry into this subculture.
00:17:42
Speaker
And it was with a wrestler here in Athens, Georgia, where I live. His name is Justin Legend. He now runs a promotion called a classic city wrestling here in Athens. They actually pair their shows with live music, which is pretty unique in the industry. And they, they, they run it in a historic music venue here in Athens.
00:18:01
Speaker
um But I, he was the first person to kind of take me behind the curtain. we sat at a coffee shop, and Probably talked for an hour and a half. And, um you know, he talked about the industry. He talked about growing up as a kid, watching wrestling with his dad.
00:18:17
Speaker
But the thing that he said that that stuck with me and really the reason why I wrote this, what inspired me to write this book was at the end of our talk, he said, he said the lines are clear.
00:18:28
Speaker
In wrestling, you know who the bad guy is, unlike in real life. And what he meant by that was, you know you know, the more that I've spent time in wrestling, it's like it makes me approach the real world with this kind of distrust in that, like, what is real? you know So the thing about wrestling, for all its hyperbole and exaggeration,
00:18:56
Speaker
It's honest with its viewers and performers about what it is. You know, it embraces its ridiculous, its ridiculousness. You know, it's like what he was saying is in the real world, that's a scary place. That's where you don't know if someone is being authentic with you with wrestling.
00:19:14
Speaker
Yeah, there' it's a performance, but you know that. yeah and and the good and And the thing about wrestling is, at its heart, it's a battle between good and evil, right? Which just resonates with anyone on the planet.
00:19:28
Speaker
And in the end, the the good guy will always win. Not every match, it's a back and forth and ebb and flow. But that's why you can sleep at night. You know, that's not the case in the real world.
00:19:41
Speaker
Yeah.
Discovering Writing Style
00:19:42
Speaker
And with wrestlers, too, it it's very stylized and and voice driven, which, yeah, ah so much of what you wrote about in the book, like I was just overlaying what it is to like be a writer, too, and especially like a working writer or an emerging writer or mid-career and you're still trying to get a toehold with some authority. And so I was thinking of voice. And you know just for you as ah as a writer, you know how did you kind of land into something that you know feels like your pocket, you know your voice?
00:20:12
Speaker
Yeah. um Do you mean like voice in writing style or is that what you mean? Yeah. Yeah. right Writing style. Yeah. And you can even expand that to, you know, what you're attracted to in your taste, because sometimes the voice comes across to what you care to report on, too.
00:20:29
Speaker
Yeah. I felt that I was the one to write this book because for a couple of reasons. Yeah. One, I'm from here. I mean, I grew up, ah my parents grew up in Buffalo, but i grew up here in Georgia, very close to a lot of where this book takes place, right? And in these these small shows were happening even when I was growing up, but I didn't know because my dad didn't watch wrestling. And it's really this generational thing I discovered. So for one thing, when I approach people, I could say, oh yeah, I'm from Hartwell, Georgia. And they're like, oh yeah, you know, I used to perform at the, you know, They knew the place and that was that signaled to them that I was safe. you know I wasn't flying in from New York or LA and just going to kind of write something transactional. I wasn't stealing their story. you know I want to celebrate them.
00:21:19
Speaker
And then another thing that when I think of voice and I think about how I wrote this book and what I learned from writing this book was initially I i was just so thrilled to have access to this community in which I found just so many compelling stories, right?
00:21:35
Speaker
So many people that had had lived hard lives and they were in the ring or around the ring because it made them feel good, right? As much as they were physically in pain a lot of the times, it kind of it delivered this catharsis that they could not get anywhere else.
00:21:53
Speaker
But what I knew was that I had to explain this to people, kind of going back to what you said. Yes, wrestling is ridiculed. It's misunderstood. It's kind of like the punching bag of American pastimes.
00:22:06
Speaker
And yeah, it's goofy. And that's why I love it. And that's why everyone loves it you know But to kind of get convince a book publisher, to convince an agent
Storytelling & Thematic Balance
00:22:16
Speaker
the the depth of what I encountered, I think that's where I found my voice.
00:22:21
Speaker
I knew that I needed to be knowledgeable enough and confident enough. And I knew that to sell the book, I needed to to kind of mine meaning. So it wasn't enough to just say, wow, look at all these these people. They're just, you know, they're wrestling on Saturday night. Wow, isn't this cool? Like that's not enough. That's not a book. So one thing I learned in the process was that um subtext matters.
00:22:47
Speaker
So It kind of, to me, when I think about this book and other great nonfiction books that I love, or it's it's almost like this volley between scene and action and dialogue and the actual story unfolding.
00:23:01
Speaker
And then the writer comes in and says, this is why this matters, or here's some context. And that's what makes a book universally appealing. And that's what I hope makes this book appealing to not only wrestling fans, but to anyone that's interested you know, American culture, sports, just theater performance. I mean, there's so many, I, I, at one point I had, uh, had this kind running document that was called universal themes, you know, and sometimes as a writer, you, yes, it's creative and it's messy, but sometimes you kind of really have to sit down and like draw it out and try to connect things that are happening, things that you're seeing.
00:23:41
Speaker
with some of these deeper meanings so that they can, can kind of, so you can have that volley in the book. When you're maybe sketching that out, is that how you start to think about structure?
00:23:53
Speaker
Yeah, I think that helps. That helps. Yeah. I think also with this book, it is somewhat, um, things happen in order. Another thing to note is that as I was writing the book, the action was still unfolding.
00:24:09
Speaker
And um that that was exciting to me. um It's kind of a challenge for probably the people that were the publisher because it's like, I didn't know how the book was going to They didn't, you know, I was like, what when do i so when do I stop following Hunter on his journey? yeah you know I had no idea really until until something happened that that I saw could be an ending. So yeah.
Overcoming Writing Challenges
00:24:34
Speaker
But yeah, so yeah, the universal themes definitely they do help with structure because you you can't go too far.
00:24:43
Speaker
It's kind of both ways. You can't spend too much time of on your soapbox explaining, right? Before you get back into the action. And then you can't have, you can't be in the action and scene for so long that the the reader kind of forgets why this is important.
00:25:00
Speaker
So it's this kind of delicate balance. Yeah, I remember having conversations with my editor, with um the front runner and stuff, when we were kind of just struggling to find, I was struggling to find the shape, and he definitely helped me shape it and structure it in a way that was, I think, satisfying.
00:25:17
Speaker
And he would always ah kind of lean on me. He's like, you know, you're the you're the expert here. You're driving the car, and everyone else is the passenger, and you need to be pointing out what's important and and tell us why. Yeah. I don't enter the story ever first person. You only come into this at the very end, yeah but you're still pointing out what's important. So I think that's it's, you can have that authorial presence without that I pronoun and being intrusive, but you are telling people, okay, like this is look over here and I'm going to tell you why. Yeah. It's so, and then like, once it clicks for me and and I'm guessing for you too, it's like, once you understand that it's like, Oh,
00:25:58
Speaker
Duh. Yes, of course. You know, but when you're beginning to write, it is, it is hard to, to, to have that confidence because to write, I think of Wright Thompson's sports writing.
00:26:11
Speaker
he is a master at this, you know, he knows, ah he knows so much about the people he's writing about, but also he's so confident in what he's delivering in his asides when he, when he writes profiles of athletes.
00:26:23
Speaker
But you know, when you're ah you know, an unheard of writer such as myself, you know, you're like, wait, but why, why do I, why am i the, you know, you're just, you got to get over that.
Hunter's Journey & Writing Parallels
00:26:34
Speaker
You just have to kind of smash through that table, you know, if you want to get wrestling with it. And you cause, cause you can't, no one wants to read something that they can sense is written by someone without confidence. Yeah, yeah. Like, ah yeah my editor would say, like, your your thumb is on the scale here. Like, this is your biography and your take on this person's, like, your interpretation. Someone else might have a different interpretation, but based on your research and reporting, this is what the meaning you have to imbue on the text. Yeah. And ah yeah, similarly, it's like you have to have like it. Well, it's all those people you interview that didn't necessarily get on the record, but they are giving you that authority so you can put your thumb on the scale of this story and it feels unique to you. Only you could have written Rough House.
00:27:20
Speaker
Absolutely. The thing, too, you said you know ah ah earlier about you know just various bits of information, like that doesn't make a book. like Really what makes a book is that narrative and and ah was it ah What was the the challenge of you know finding the drive and the engine ah for this book?
00:27:40
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, Hunter is, was a joy to spend time with an interview. It's fun to hang out with young people. you know One time at a show, someone, someone asked if I was his mom or actually didn't even ask. They just assumed it was his mom.
00:27:59
Speaker
it's Wow. Okay. But I mean, he has that, he has the energy and drive of a young person and he doesn't have fear. I mean, and he doesn't, he doesn't give a shit what you think if, you know, if you think he's he's stupid for making this life choice, for following his dream. And that's really fun to be around, you know, and and that barely, that exists less in older characters. So I think for him to be the person to push the book forward
00:28:32
Speaker
You know, push the chapters forward. it was just a natural. it was natural because it was kind of a coming of age for him. i mean, when i met him, he was a few days shy, had his 17th birthday. Now he's probably 22 23.
00:28:45
Speaker
two or twenty three I mean, a lot changes in those years, right? He graduated high school. I mean, he he he really dove deep into, you know, this this quest to become ah a professional, professional wrestler. so it was just so natural. i mean, once once I landed on on him as the main character, i knew that that it was gold because ah the confidence in in him being so young and him being in such a dangerous industry, it's like something, but something's bound to happen. Right. And, and luckily he's okay. Like he's not paralyzed or, you know, he's hasn't broken anything, um which does happen quite often. um
00:29:31
Speaker
You know, in, in 20 years, he's probably going to be in, a lot of pain if he continues this, yeah but he doesn't care.
Wrestling vs Writing Careers
00:29:39
Speaker
yeah Well, a lot of it, you know, to want to pursue professional wrestling and even to be a professional writer, there is ah a certain level of delusion and and self-belief that you just have to surrender to. Right. And like, I imagine you, you saw a lot of that energy coming, you know, in your reporting.
00:29:57
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, I have told people that I don't, I can't pinpoint the moment where this, you know, became illuminated for me. But being an indie professional wrestler is so much like being a writer, especially a freelance writer. i mean, it's constant hustle. It's constant um showmanship. It's constant putting yourself out there and hoping that you know the right person will see you.
00:30:23
Speaker
It's just so much work. So I think he and i had that in common. So I could really appreciate what he was doing because in a way I was doing the same thing. Yeah, there's there's um a moment in the book, too, where you liken some of the... It might have been when Hunter and um you know one of his other partners was kind of called up to w WWE like or or some somewhere of a high-profile event, basically for free, but for the exposure. I was like, well, this reminds me a lot of like a lot of the the writing and stuff that that we'll do for free here and there. Because you just have to be in as many places as possible because maybe lightning in a bottle will strike and you just want to be out there. Maybe you'll get noticed. Maybe the right person will read a thing and be like, oh, what else are you working on? Let's all work together. Like there's so many parallels like that.
00:31:10
Speaker
So absolutely. There's other another moment, too, that really resonated with me just in terms of um the the writer path, too. I think ah this classic thing of like looking over your shoulder and yeah someone else is like, why is that person getting signed and I'm not?
00:31:26
Speaker
And yeah that degree of comparison and envy and jealousy is so apparent in our line of work, too. yeah How have you navigated you know those feelings there where it looks like, wow, I'm I have those chops too. and i'm just Man, I don't feel like I'm getting that opportunity. i mean Again, with the similarities, the professional wrestling, the gatekeepers, it's so subjective, yeah just as it is in our industry. right yeah It's subjective and it's about who you know. i mean That's also true of of being a writer.
00:31:58
Speaker
and i it was it was a tough sell. i um you know Just going back to what we said earlier about wrestling, i think that It is ridiculous, but the stereotype persists in, you know, let's see, literary communities. I don't know what the correct way to say it is, but the higher you go on the literary scale, I guess, the more they look down on something like professional wrestling.
00:32:27
Speaker
And I think I have thought about the reasons for that. i think part of it is like the the fans of professional wrestling by and large are kind of working class people.
00:32:38
Speaker
Many of, I mean, wrestling's everywhere, but it it has a particular stronghold here in the South. So one thing that happened when I was doing the book proposal, when I sent the, when we sent the book proposal out, one thing I should say, I was lucky enough to start working with the literary agent, David Black in New York. um gay He's a powerhouse.
Publishing Challenges & Perseverance
00:32:59
Speaker
Yeah. The first thing, the one phone call that I have with with an editor, his first question was, how did you get in with David Black? i was like um and And how I did that was ah John T. Edge, author, journalist, writer, human extraordinaire, was one of my mentors at the at UGA's MFA program.
00:33:21
Speaker
And he was actually the first one to really read what I was working on and believe in it and really push me toward this book. So he connected me with David. I spent a year on the book proposal.
00:33:32
Speaker
We sent it out to probably 30 or so New York publishers. Got a lot of graceful no's. What I read in between those lines of those no's was that wrestling fans don't read, which I think is not true.
00:33:47
Speaker
i think I think there's a lot. I mean, I just had i just did a podcast with um with a PhD who also has yeah has a full-time job at a university, but he's a wrestling fan and and runs a wrestling show. So that's not true.
00:34:02
Speaker
But I think you know part of what um i wanted my book to do was defy some of those stereotypes. And also think about movies like The Wrestler. Think about The Iron Claw movie.
00:34:14
Speaker
how critically acclaimed some of these films are and stuff. That tells me that, that you know, that people are interested in it. But one piece, so anyway, the the book proposal went out, got a lot of graceful news, got one call from um an editor at Norton, who was then at one of Norton's imprints.
00:34:35
Speaker
He believed in the book. He wanted to offer me a contract. He couldn't talk the editorial board into it. So there was actually a time where i was faced with a decision of, okay, do you want to, you know, table this for a while, maybe rework the proposal a little bit, give it some time, or do you want to bail on the projects altogether?
00:34:57
Speaker
and one of the pieces of feedback that David delivered to me from from editors that he had heard from was that, you know, Allison has not written for the New Yorker. She hasn't written for the Atlantic, right?
00:35:09
Speaker
who is she, you know, and why, why, why why is she writing? And why do we care about this book? um So that kind of pissed me off. So yeah I did go out and get a Washington post clip and, and it actually was a ah very, very important story that Washington post story about, about something that was happening in my hometown.
00:35:29
Speaker
ah But I did take offense to that. And I think that's, again, it, I see that as also to kind of, just impulsive dismissiveness about something that you don't understand. And in this, yes, I'm talking about the book, but I'm talking about so many other things in the world.
Industry Feedback as Motivation
00:35:46
Speaker
People's first instinct when they don't understand something is to dismiss it. So with this book, I hope that people do read it. I hope that people learn about not only wrestling as this kind of ah joyful, cathartic American pastime, but also learn a little bit about, you know, the place that I grew up and the people that are here and and what it means to them.
00:36:06
Speaker
When you hear editors of that nature saying like, oh, she hasn't appeared here, here and here, like, what does that do to your confidence? It motivates me. you know And I think it motivates Hunter too. i mean, in in his world, you know, when you, mean you when you asked me about that part in the book where he's kind of getting angry that he feels so confident in his abilities and his performance, but yeah, he's, he's getting, you know people are, people are getting drafted ahead of him. Right. And it's hard to for him to understand.
00:36:35
Speaker
So what does he do? he just pushes harder. You know, he works out harder. He makes himself bigger. He, he just, he goes to four shows in a weekend. i mean, and I think that's what I tried to do also. Yeah. What, what does four shows in a weekend look like to you as ah from ah from the writer angle?
00:36:53
Speaker
I think I just really got, you know, after I did hear that feedback um I, I left the proposal alone for a while and and started pitching stories again as a freelance writer.
00:37:06
Speaker
I did a piece for um the AJC. I did this Washington Post piece about um a trans man in my hometown that was trying to start up a pride parade.
00:37:17
Speaker
And then a pastor, a Baptist pastor that I had met through that, who was actually just so welcoming, not only to the LGBTQ community and in where I grew up in small town Georgia, but um to everybody. And people were kind of mad at him for that.
00:37:33
Speaker
And that was a delightful time, you know, just to get back out there and kind of do more of that boots on the ground writing. So I think it was a really good exercise for me. You know, when you're writing a book, I i mean, obviously i was I was at a lot of shows in the reporting this book. I was away from my home a lot, but I also was alone a lot in, you know, in my in front of my computer. But what I really love about writing is being out there and talking to people. I think hearing no just made me want it more and put the work into it. Yeah. And you said your proposal process, you know, took you about a year. Similarly, it took me about a year to really hone the Prefontaine one, especially someone like me. i I'm not a I'm not like a writer for The Athletic or all this. Like I don't have that big banner name.
Crafting a Book Proposal
00:38:22
Speaker
So there was a lot of.
00:38:23
Speaker
had to really sell, ah like sell myself, be like, who's this motherfucker and why are we going to give him a book contract? And, um, and so it took a long time, but it yeah So in that year that you were writing the book proposal, what were some of the hurdles and challenges that you had in generating it?
00:38:39
Speaker
Well, I think we, so David and i spent several months just trying to narrow down the kind of, it's kind of like casting really, you know, yeah i had had access to so many people with interesting stories, but what he said to me over and over again was, um,
00:38:54
Speaker
Narrative arc, narrative arc all the time. Yeah, yeah. And ah David's a great agent. He can be a man of few words. So a lot of times our conversations would, that might be the only thing he said. And it was like, okay, I get it. i get it. yeah What he wanted to know, what he needed to know in order to sell the book was like, where does this book start?
00:39:16
Speaker
And if you can't tell me where it ends, at least tell me what's, you know, what are the ups and downs? What's going to happen along the way? You know? Yeah. Yeah, that's really, really astute for sure. Like in the book proposal I'm working on now, based on the experience of the one that I had before, was like, okay, like I'm breaking down. i don't have i don't i don't necessarily have to break do whole sample chapters, but I'm like, all right what does part one look like? What does part two look like? What does part three look like? I'm thinking like, macro arc and then all these micro arcs. And it's just like, okay, now you're starting to speak their language and now this is how you can maybe get this thing through. So then you can be turned loose to report and research. But until you learn that language, Matt, you're you're just spinning your tires in the mud.
00:40:00
Speaker
Yeah. And I guess to continue the the story about how i ended up getting the book contract was that um I did, I went back to the proposal and I I did rework it. I put Hunter and his father kind of, I led off with that in the original proposal. That was a little, I was focusing on kind of more about the history of wrestling and and kind of leaning into these themes that I had discovered, but, but the character part of it was kind of coming second. So, you know, what's more universal than a parent and child story. So that ended up being front and center. Another thing that happened was in that time, I didn't originally have access to Hunter's father, Billy Ray, because he didn't want to talk to me.
00:40:44
Speaker
so I knew that I wouldn't be able to tell the story as well as I wanted to, if I didn't have access to him. And that would kind of kept me up at night for a long time.
00:40:56
Speaker
I was hopeful that with time and I don't want to give anything away, but you know, there's something happens in the book where Hunter and his father are not getting along.
Character Development through Interviews
00:41:05
Speaker
for for many months. And I was, I was interviewing Hunter during this time.
00:41:12
Speaker
And I really wanted to spend time with his dad to get his side of it. And he didn't want anything anything to do with me. So it was probably, i mean, many months later, i had, i was at a writing residency at the Hambridge center in North Georgia. So I had two weeks to myself without Wi-Fi and cell signal.
00:41:30
Speaker
And, um, and I got him to talk to me. and you know It's like we had a phone call and it was um was fantastic. and then we Then he became part of my reporting and then it was just hugely valuable for the book. so That's also probably what helped sell the proposal. but Anyway, that one editor from Norton who had who had believed in the book was still there and had been since promoted. so When we came back to him with the revised proposal then It still took a couple more months, but that's, yeah. Oh, wow. That dovetails nicely. Cause I have a question highlighted over here is just like, uh, just what was the pitch like for you to, to get access to Hunter, but you know, here, Billy Ray too, who was very reluctant to speak to you for a long time. yeah How were you able to navigate that?
00:42:19
Speaker
Well, ah the other thing was i didn't, when I first started spending time with Hunter, i had no idea that I'd be writing a book cause this was back in 2019. I was just starting the MFA program that fall. So at first I was just, you know, what I would tell, I told him what I would tell everybody, which was, ah you know, i I'm interested in writing about this community. i did a couple of magazine pieces. I'm not really sure it's going to end up. And then later as, as the years and months went path, went by, it became, I'm working on a book proposal. I'd like to write a book, but I, you know, um I'm in kind of the researching phase right now.
00:42:53
Speaker
And then finally it was like, Okay, Hunter, um I really think that you need to be the kind of central focus of this book. How do you feel about that? You know, because of course, I didn't, I want it to be transparent. And of course, he was thrilled, because again, i hope that this is good for his career, too.
00:43:11
Speaker
he's he's in the business of self-promotion. more so than me, you know? um so you know, for him, anything that gets his name out there is great. It wasn't like I walked in the front door to the landmark arena in Cornelius, Georgia and said, Hey, I'm writing a book. You know, yeah it didn't happen that way. I, that came, that happened many, many, many years later. And what do you think the, the subculture of amateur professional wrestling or even professional wre wrestling, like what do you think that's really tapping into?
00:43:43
Speaker
I think that professional wrestling just totally mirrors humanity. And what I mean by that is, think about your own life. And I think about my life.
00:43:54
Speaker
You know, last night I went to my friend Beth Birch's book launch. she's a She's a lawyer, a law school professor, professor a legal scholar, but also a narrative nonfiction writer.
00:44:05
Speaker
So after that, I was in a room with ah with basically like the entire UGA law school, which is not my usual setting.
Wrestling Reflecting Real Life
00:44:13
Speaker
But again, it's like, we when we when we as human beings are in different spaces, we put on, we play up different sides of our personality, right?
00:44:22
Speaker
that's all that wrestling is, is like playing up different character elements in a ring and then punching and throwing people around while you're doing it. So once you know once I realized that, it's like, it's not not only the you know the character elements that we present to other people, it's like,
00:44:41
Speaker
we do hurt each other. We go after each other in real life. You know, we we exaggerate our experiences. We do we blend fact and fiction. of course we do, you know? so it it's like the stuff that happens in the ring is the stuff of life.
00:44:56
Speaker
And I think that's what I'm trying to show people in this book is like, I'll read a line from the proposal here just because i' I've got to open on my computer. In a world where truth is increasingly elusive, it's wrestling that offers certainty.
00:45:11
Speaker
and then And then also amidst the savagery, there's gentleness and amidst the, beneath the illusion, integrity. So that's another thing that I encountered was this this trust. I mean, if you're you're getting into a ring with someone ah and being thrown around and potentially landing on your neck, you know you're putting your life in someone's hands really.
00:45:34
Speaker
So there's as as wild and crazy and violent as it is, it's also so gentle and so respectful and there's so much trust there. And it's it's so valuable in the lives of people who are involved on it and involved in it. And you know what I realized by the end um and the reason that i inject myself back in um And we could talk about this. um i just kind of was thinking about the discussions I had my editor about like,
00:46:04
Speaker
will Will you use the word I? Will you be in the book? And I had strong feelings about that, but I do come back at the end of the book because I really feel like there's something so valuable about play fighting.
00:46:17
Speaker
so if you have kids and if you, if you were ever a kid, you remember how fun it is to like wrestle your sibling right on like the mattress, living room floor or whatever. And it's like, you never want of course you didn't want to get hurt.
Universal Appeal of Wrestling
00:46:32
Speaker
You didn't,
00:46:32
Speaker
probably didn't want to really hurt your sibling. um Maybe you did. But you know you learn boundaries and within this physical interaction. right And then then you're all sweaty and excited and you're like you feel better about life. you know You're less stressful.
00:46:48
Speaker
So I kind of make this plea of like, we should all be play fighting in our underwear. you know like that's That's one of Hunter's ah phrases is like, wrestling, it's play fighting in your underwear. It's like, why do why do why do we stop play fighting when it delivers so much to us emotionally?
00:47:06
Speaker
Well, there's an element of we just as adults forget how to play in general, be it, you know, like very few people go out and join a beer league softball thing and try to tap into the things that were fun when they were younger, like just surrender to the quiet desperation of the long malaise.
00:47:23
Speaker
Yes, exactly. A hundred percent. Yeah. It's playful. And it, and it knows that professional wrestling. I mean, Yeah. Yeah, that moment when you come in the book, I believe one of the first sentences was like, this is a subculture i I sought to disrobe. And that's kind of good like getting down to the plague in our underwear. But that's that's ultimately what you do in 260 some odd pages. Like that's, yeah, you you do disrobe it, but you ultimately have like a kind of ah a deep respect for it. I'd say even a love for the subculture. Yes. And I feel like I've grown quite defensive about it, you know, um not only defensive of the people that I spent time with, the but wrestling as a whole, um because I do find it.
00:48:09
Speaker
I think it's just so valuable as as something that is in most parts of the country. You're probably not more than an hour or a few hours away from a small town indie wrestling show. Certainly in Georgia, you're never more than an hour away from one. thing yeah And it's just about the most fun you can have on a Saturday night.
00:48:30
Speaker
I bet. Yeah. it ah Yeah. The backyarders, as you as you call them, right? Yes. They're on that wobbly low rung of the... Yeah. what what What does it take to make it in professional wrestling?
00:48:45
Speaker
Yeah. I think it's a lot of luck. It's a lot of luck and it's a lot of knowing the right people, but it's also... intense training, intense shaping of your body. You know you're, you're, you're shaping your body to, to look like something that people want to see on TV.
00:49:03
Speaker
Now, sometimes that is you know, it doesn't have to be like a huge Hulk Hogan body, but it's something that has to reflect the character that you're going to play. Right. And these, i you know, these, I guess, pictures of what's you know, the casting office wants at any certain time, it shifts, right? So, you know, maybe maybe a Hunter's persona, the character he plays and his look, maybe 15 years ago, that was what people wanted. Or maybe in in two years, it will be what people want again. You know, you just
Wrestling & Personal Growth
00:49:37
Speaker
don't know. And and really, when you're at this level, you have no way of knowing.
00:49:41
Speaker
So i don't I don't think there is any kind of perfect um elixir. Mm-hmm. It's a lot of continuing to show up, continuing to work, and to take it seriously. And really, his whole life is wrestling. He has a full-time 9-to-5 job, but before that and after that, it's training, it's working out, it's practicing.
00:50:05
Speaker
it's networking and it's just years and years and years of that. Oh, wow. How has he come to re reconcile the, just the uncontrollable nature or what's out of his control? Um, yeah. How has he been able to navigate that? I mean, that you can extrapolate that to writing too. It's just so much of that. Like, again, I keep coming back to that, but I read this book as a writer. I'm like, my God, they're like, there's no difference here.
00:50:30
Speaker
Yes, exactly. Well, and I think, um, I think this what happens for a lot of people in wrestling and and definitely in writing too. It's like, you might start out with these these grand dreams of, you know, being a New Yorker staff writer.
00:50:46
Speaker
But at some point, you're just like, yeah, i think I'm good. Just kind of like writing for this regional magazine that pays me well and and I enjoy the work and I get to go on like you know trips with my family. There's nothing wrong with that, okay? like there's ah So I think that for a lot of wrestlers, that's what happens is for most of them, there was a time in their life when they really thought like, man, I'm gonna go, I'm gonna go all the way. yeah And then eventually they know that that's not gonna happen and they don't care because they are having just as much fun performing in front of 100 people at the Boys and Girls Club in Monroe, Georgia on Saturday night, it still delivers to them this thing that is the most important part of all this, which is this catharsis, the thing that they can do this on Saturday night, and then be a satisfied, nice human being Monday through Friday, you know, Yeah.
00:51:39
Speaker
Yeah. it's It's wild to think that. But at least with with us as writers, like maybe that maybe as our our ambitions shift and like maybe we, you know, we do have those
Alison's Writing Process
00:51:49
Speaker
you know starry eyes to be like that New Yorker staff writer. And then, yeah, priorities shift. We're like, ah it'd be nice to maybe crack in, but it's not the end of the world if not. And, uh, but because of the, by virtue of this, the older we get, maybe the more, the more skilled we get, you know, and that door is never really closed in the way that it's going to close for Hunter eventually.
00:52:09
Speaker
Yes. Thank God us writers do not have to be physically as strong. time right Yeah. yeah I mean, there, but yes, for many wrestlers, you know,
00:52:23
Speaker
I just thought of something, which is that age, you think about age and especially with the the male body. What's interesting about what's what's happening in this book is like Hunter's father is constantly trying to look and feel younger. Hunter is constantly trying to look and feel older in order to kind of so they're both like racing toward this, like some ideal, ah you know, display of man, right? Yeah.
00:52:51
Speaker
Um, so that was actually something else that kind of, I feel like that was one thing I maybe wish I had dug in deeper too in the book. That was one thing my editor was like, yeah, you gotta like dig into that.
00:53:02
Speaker
What was it like for you is being a woman and then being in this world of, uh, of just hyper masculinity. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I will say ah it was great. I mean, i and I started doing this reporting before I knew anything about I'd ever heard the word toxic masculinity. And I have to say it never, ever felt that way in these spaces that I was in.
00:53:26
Speaker
Also, there's other women there. um Definitely far fewer women than men performers on this level and on all levels in wrestling. um But I was impressed these spaces that I was in.
00:53:38
Speaker
it was all pretty professional. Like even if it was, a even if it was all men, they were out of respect for them, for each other, for me or for whoever, like when they're changing there, they have like this, they have in their bags, they carry towels that they can like remove their pants and put on their other, their gear and stuff. So, I mean, it's probably, I've never been backstage at a a community theater, but I think probably it's similar to that. But yeah, I, um, i never felt unsafe at all ever.
00:54:10
Speaker
Yeah. When did you know you were like ready to start really writing like, uh, you know, like in unmask where most of the research might've been done. You're like, all right, now it's time to write a book. Yeah. It was probably after i got the book contract.
00:54:26
Speaker
I mean, as you know, as someone who's written a book proposal, A book proposal is, i always heard people say, if you you know the book proposal is harder than writing the book, which I kind of disagree with, but I do see why people say that. I think after I got the book deal, which would have been fall 23, I really, really started writing in January of 24, and I spent the whole year.
Overcoming Writing Challenges
00:54:49
Speaker
so I turned it in in January 25. But yeah, I do remember after I i had like had spent so much time just like pushing and pushing to get a book contract and then I got it. And I did have this moment of like, holy shit, I have to write the book. yeah That 2 a.m. voice is terrifying. Yeah, it was like, what have I done? Yeah. So it's probably January of 24. And I the way I was able to wrap my brain around that, and then make it not feel so insurmountable, because my background, what comes from magazines, and some newspaper where word counts are like 200 40.
00:55:30
Speaker
2,000 words, right? And then I was going for 80,000 on this book. I mean, it's like hard to even imagine. So I chopped it up into 20,000 word sections. I remember when I first got to that 20,000 mark, I was ready to just like run down the road and open the parade. I was so excited like that i could that I did it. yeah And then once I had the 20,000 done, it was like, okay, it got to 40,000.
00:55:55
Speaker
And then all of a sudden, then you're like rocking and rolling. It's like, oh yeah, I can get to 80, no problem. You know, once you get in the groove. Yeah. I remember like, so I had the, my in the contract, of course, this is kind of fluid. It's like I had to hit 85 to 95,000 words. Yeah. I was worried that I was just going to regurgitate things that had been written before. And I was worried of even making it to that mark. Yeah.
00:56:19
Speaker
And I wasn't even halfway through, say, like the narrative proper. And I had hit like 80,000. So I went, I blew through to 160 in my first rough draft. Oh my God, that's that's like two books. was And I ended up cutting essentially a book
Writing Inspiration
00:56:34
Speaker
from it. I cut like 60,000 words. So was like, it had to be there, but it was just like... it It was really kind of terrifying. And I had a pretty short runway too. So I had in my master spreadsheet, which I call like the brain of the operation or the central nervous system. I had like, you know, word, i like word count per day, like how what I needed to average per day to hit this on time. And it was like, if I did just like 250 or 300 a day, i was going to hit it. So it was always like, just knock out that little bit. Okay.
00:57:05
Speaker
Then back out and then make phone calls and do other newspaper stuff. But it just like kept me on pace. Yes. I think that's really helpful to, you you kind of have to, you can't just sit down at a blank piece of paper and say, okay, zero to a hundred thousand words go. Yeah. You got to really break it up. Like the way you did it, that's just, you have to make it manageable. And it's like, you can't run 26 miles in 10 strides. It's like yeah thousands and thousands. Like you break it down and just be in that moment at that time. And eventually you trust that process and then it accretes.
00:57:37
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. I will say when I did start finally writing or putting it all together, as a writer, I've always, i always start with the listening to my interviews and my interviews become the story or the book. So it was a lot of, it was a lot of that, like re-listening to things and then kind of creating those scenes. And then it just kind of keeps going. Yeah. Was there a piece of ah just ah writing advice that you really leaned on from, be it maybe hard one on yourself, ah from yourself or just from Ted Conover John T. Edge? that helped power you through in those dark nights of the soul?
Joy in Writing & Wrestling
00:58:17
Speaker
I think one thing that John T always says is um don't say i have to write, say I get to write. you know like It's not it is a it's it's not a job.
00:58:30
Speaker
no one is making me no one made me write this book. I made myself because I wanted it. I wanted it to i wanted this book to be out there in the world. um So I think kind of reminding myself that it's like, this is what I'm good at.
00:58:45
Speaker
And this is what I love to do. And I should be happy doing this. I should, it, I think the moment it becomes a a job or the moment it feels like work is, that's kind of when you know that you need to move to something, move to a different project. Yeah. I'm reading, I think you pronounce his name Geary. I'll say Geary, but it might be Geary or something like that, but Geary Nathan's The Changeover about Alcaraz and Sinner, this new way, these new tennis rivalry. His book came out last year and i'm reading it now. It's excellent. And Alcaraz, Carlos Alcaraz is one of the better tennis players in the world. Like ah after winning a tournament, you know, he just said something to the extent of like, it's just very simple. He was in pain, but he ended up winning the French. And it's like, you have to find the joy in the suffering. And like there yeah and there is so much of that kind of self-loathing when it comes to writing, too. But like when you get to do it, but then you ground yourself, be like, oh, no, like a pro pushes through. And I yeah finding the joy in the suffering. I really ah really like resonate with that because it's not easy.
00:59:48
Speaker
But you do have to just find like, oh, wow, you you got to kind of lean into that discomfort because yeah this is normal. yeah When you normalize that discomfort, it actually kind of greases the skids for you.
00:59:59
Speaker
And then you get that there are those writing highs, you know, like I just love every time would go to a wrestling show and I would come home and I'd be like, no, I got some good stuff. You know, got some good stuff, you know, like that's and then when you're listening to it, you know, months later you're like, oh, yes, that's that's going to be so great. I can tell you're having a good time writing the book because I write a little one-page book reports, if you will.
Writing Creativity
01:00:27
Speaker
Some little things that I pulled out that you wrote that were like your turns of phrase, like a world of brutal promise, a violent utopia, a wrestler's moves are like words in a story. I'm like, these are just really great cracking things that are painting the portrait. But I can also tell like you're imbuing a certain measure of meaning, and I can tell you're having fun in the text. And that's probably one of those moments where you're like, yeah, this is pretty damn good here. I wrote something good. Yeah. Yeah. You know, another, another tip is, uh, I had this, I had a couple of ongoing word documents. One was, um called wrestling words. And it was, was, it wasn't, it was, some of it was like wrestling jargon. um and others were you know, anytime, and I still do this, although I've a little bit fallen out of habit. Um,
01:01:18
Speaker
when I was working in these years when i was working on the book, anytime I read a story about anything and i and I saw a word that I liked that I thought maybe I could use, it went into that document just as like a single word. Or maybe was a word I hadn't heard before and I needed to look at the definition and then that's where it went. And so sometimes as I was kind of editing myself, I would go to that document and just scan it and then kind of like feed my brain those words and hope that my brain would then deliver them to the page in the right way. Yeah. A lot of those little things that, yeah, when I'm out for a run or something, I always keep a notebook on me, a writer's writing notebook. So it'll, if I'm sweating and it's on yeah close to my skin, it won't ruin. um But yeah, a little, those like little things like that, like, you know, the world, a world of brutal prom is like, I just, i love that so much. it's like, yeah oh, something like that might come to me on a run. I'm like, I got to capture it. It's like butterfly. got to get it. Middle of the night. I used to early on, I just remember waking up in the middle of the night and writing a sentence or just, you know, you just wake up with something in your mind. That's another good indicator that this is what you should be working on. Like this is the thing that thrills you. And there is just there's just no better feeling than that.
01:02:27
Speaker
Unless maybe you're a professional wrestler and you're in the ring. Again, back to the parallel. It's like kind of similar to what I heard yeah performers say.
Recommended Reading & Closing Reflections
01:02:36
Speaker
It was like the high that you get after you perform is kind of like the high you get when you when you write a sentence or when you wake up in the middle the night with a sentence in your mind. You're like, yeah, that's pretty good. yeah I'm going to write that with that. Yeah. Unfortunately, there's no real, to use the wrestling term, there's no real pop when you write that good sentence. No one's cheering and setting off bottle rockets. You're alone in the room and it's three o'clock and then you go back to bed. Yeah.
01:02:59
Speaker
Well, Alice, I feel like we could chat for hours about this kind of stuff. There's so many great themes themes in the book. I think we talked on a few that were pretty fun. But as I bring these conversations down for a landing, I always love asking the guests, you in this case, just for a recommendation of some kind for the listeners. and that's just like anything you're excited about that you want to share.
01:03:18
Speaker
Yeah. um Let me think of what i you know, I would say if you haven't read a Josie Reisman's book, Ringmaster, it's I think the subtitle is The Unmaking of America.
01:03:31
Speaker
it It is about professional wrestling, but it really, um, draws a pretty heavy line between what's happening in politics in America right now to professional wrestling via Vince McMahon and his relationship with Donald Trump.
01:03:47
Speaker
And the kind of the inspiration that part of, I really like, don't I try to steer clear of politics, but the book is really illuminating. And Josie's a lifelong wrestling fan. so But once you read it, you will no longer look at politics or anything else for that matter the same again. And you certainly won't look at wrestling the same again. Oh, amazing. Well, Allison, thank you so much for carving out time to talk shop and come on the show and talk about your wonderful book. And ah yeah, is a lot lot of fun. I look forward to future conversations down the road. This is great.
01:04:22
Speaker
Yeah. Thank you for having me,
01:04:30
Speaker
Awesome. Thanks to Allison for coming to RIF with me. No, we didn't win the Golden Globe for Best Podcast. Is there a more ludicrous award out there? Will they add Best Blog next year? Best Substack?
01:04:43
Speaker
The absurdity of this world, man. I can't even. So I was dropping off my lady wife at work the other day, which is something I love doing. yeah know, we throw the dogs in the car. We listen to the final segment of the first hour of the Dan Patrick Show.
01:04:56
Speaker
It's usually kind of like annoyingly collar heavy. Neither here nor there. It's dark out. It's quiet. It's cold. And on my way back, it's the rare time I'm filled with a little bit of optimism, a little bit of possibility. Yeah, maybe even hope.
01:05:12
Speaker
You know, strike that, strike that. But still, it's a nice feeling that I like to surrender to and keep going as long as possible. yeah At this time of day, it's about 7 a.m. m by now, the world has yet to really trespass on my day. you know Put better, I haven't invited the world into my day via obsessive email checks and...
01:05:33
Speaker
Compulsive checking of Instagram, blueski, substack, YouTube, even Patreon's more cloistered social media footprint. Patreon.com slash cnfpod. When this happens, it's like I've left the front door open to my house and anything can just flow right in.
01:05:50
Speaker
Bugs, a breeze, some fucking drifter, your mom. JK, but seriously, the only way to keep this shit from passively cluttering up my headspace is to shut the door and turn the damn deadbolt.
01:06:03
Speaker
The practice of deadbolting, for me, allows me to sink into the highlight of my day, which is always my journaling. I've got my coffee, and there's this very little tech around me.
01:06:17
Speaker
In a perfect world, on a perfect morning, I put my phone in another room, or at the very least, ah beyond arm length, and ideally, ideally, ideally, out of sight.
01:06:29
Speaker
It's like, I don't crave Oreo cookies if they're not in the house, but if you put a sleeve of fucking Oreos within arm's length, and within eyesight of me, everybody...
01:06:40
Speaker
B.O.' 's getting on the shame train because those Oreos are going down. you know Sometimes I'll even put the noise-canceling earmuff things on my head. They're not even headphones. They're just yeah ear protection. if you're Cutting the grass or something like those things. Shooting your gun.
01:06:57
Speaker
And ah just putting those on my head, it really limits the noise that comes in. And it's a symbol, a symbol or a signal, I should say, to focus. And the only sound I can really discern is ah the incessant ringing of tinnitus or tinnitus from listening to heavy metal. All those years, still going.
01:07:21
Speaker
It does have a way of shutting out the world, which is pretty cool. Then, since I you know read a lot for the work and the podcast, i yeah I like to read. And if I don't have a call or any I need to jump on, I like reading first thing in the morning you as a way to just keep you keep the the digital onslaught from coming. yeah Ideally, it's a paper book, but I also have this geriatric iPad for reading books in PDF form, and I have a Kindle for reading NetGalley books. i don't buy anything from Amazon, but I have this Kindle, and I can get NetGalley things kicked to it.
01:07:58
Speaker
yeah My eyes are still fresh and my brain is not hot-wired from the attack on civil liberties as we know it. It's a slow time and a quiet time, ideally, most of the time. And the more I can keep that deadbolt locked, the more centered I feel, the more productive I feel. Not that we always have to be productive, but it makes me feel like that degree of production and forward propulsion makes me feel good.
01:08:24
Speaker
Which makes me feel as if I'm contributing something good because so much is out of our control and maybe the only way to combat all of this shit is by putting that proverbial flower down the muzzle over of the rifle.
01:08:37
Speaker
But man, that deadbolt is slippery. It wants to unclick and let the world wash over us and paralyze us into submission. I think a lot of us have been feeling that way. I know I have.
01:08:48
Speaker
Much of this we invite, but once we invite it, it's like a sludge that can't that we can't easily mop up. Or it makes the door nearly impossible to shut. You're trying to keep the zombie horde at bay, and they're sticking their arms to the door jam. He's like trying to slam that fucking ding shut.
01:09:09
Speaker
At some point, the door has to open, or maybe we do step outside, shut the door behind us, so there is refuge. There is sanctuary. I'm not saying it easy. My gosh, I am really shitty at it.
01:09:21
Speaker
But with each day, we get that blank slate and the agency to turn that deadbolt and hear that satisfying click as a way to say that maybe I don't have control over much, but I do have control over this.
01:09:37
Speaker
And that's just going to have to be good enough for now. In any case, stay wild, C&Evers. And if you can't do interviews, see you.