Terrible Audience
I love my friends and my family. They have awesome taste and are interesting people. But you know what? They are a terrible audience for me. Truly crap. To a great extent, they do not read my work at all, and those that do have little or nothing outside of “good job” to say about it.
Last year I finished my book. I had some valuable help from a local writer’s group who gave me loads of feedback. They engaged with the content and gave encouraging compliments. They also picked it apart in every way imaginable, giving notes on content, tone, flow, structure, and grammar. It was awesome.
Armed with the finished copy in hand, I became anxious to have the people I know read it. I compiled a list of my friends and family that I thought would give me good insight and emailed it off. Weeks went by. I heard nothing. I casually asked those closest to me if they had a chance to read it yet. I was met with awkward silence and polite excuses and worse yet, those who told me they did and it was great. One person did finish my book. My mom. I had given her a printed copy and she returned it to me, with a few punctuation corrections marked in red pen. She was very complimentary but our conversation about the work never got past, “good job” and “I’m so proud.”
Honestly, I don’t know what I was expecting from my people. I suppose that they would at least read it. I guess my high hopes were for the kind of compliments that reflect engagement and understanding. But that is too much to ask from them and I think I’ve figured out why.
What I’ve learned is that my friends and family are not my audiences. A few maybe, but that isn’t what they’re there for. They’re there to celebrate with me when others read me and commiserate with me when they don’t. I remember my first experience of being this kind of support person when I went to my older brother’s middle school band concert. It was terrible. Even as a child I knew this. My parents even winced during the painful event. But afterward, we all went out for ice cream and they raved about it to my brother. I thought they were crazy. But since then I’ve learned that they weren’t complimenting his amazing performance on the trumpet but that he put it out there for others to hear. It was eye-opening to me and a lesson that would serve me through hundreds of events, performances, and artistic endeavors of family and friends throughout my life.
Of course, when it comes to my own art, I am routinely convinced that my people will be spellbound by it. From my first ballet recital, I looked to my closest friends and family to sit through the entire show and tell me how great it was. Where does that self-importance come from? I so want to believe that what I do is good that I force those captive members to reinforce that. Take my husband, who dutifully reads each of my Medium articles. But that’s not enough for me. I want to know what he thinks. Sometimes he just says, “It’s good.” Am I happy with that? No! I want to know what is good about it. I want him to show true engagement. But honestly, that “good job” is his solidarity for me just putting my shit out there.
So where do I go from here? I guess it’s time to learn to know my audience. I’m here on Medium getting reads, claps, and comments. I’m having a great time. As for my friends and family? When they ask me what I’m up to I’ll tell them and they’ll say, “good job.” And when my book is published I will give them each an autographed copy that will likely sit prominently on their bookshelves unread. More importantly, if it isn’t published they will say that’s a shame because I am such a great writer. And I love them for that.
