Eduardo Halfon Takes Questions (and Comments) From a
Group of "Throwaways"
December 16, 2020
People call them Throwaways because they’re good for nothing. I met them on my last afternoon in Bogotá, in an industrial zone called Puente Aranda, under an airy, almost invisible drizzle that wasn’t enough to get anything wet.
I had been in Bogotá for a week, counting the days until I could go home to Nebraska, where my son was about to be born, and taking part in so many library and bookstore events that they were starting to blend into one. The same audience. The same topics. The same questions. And not only the same questions, but my same answers. Mechanical, worn-out answers I’d polished and practiced until I knew perfectly well which one would spark a laugh, or empathy, or silence. Over the years a writer develops a spiel that doesn’t just prop up his work but also his whole reason for being a writer. He perfects the foundational myth (how he started writing: by accident, to save his life), the slightly eccentric details of the daily routine (writing every morning, in solitude, cat next to the keyboard), the false modesty (really, deep down, he has no idea how he does what he does), the cynical-writer pose (hand on forehead, legs crossed, a humble but at the same time deep, self-assured look, half closing his eyes). Thing is, sitting down and trying to express an idea or an emotion or a story in words is not the same as being on tour later and trying to explain those words, trying to give them meaning or at least a semblance of order. Writing is not the same as being a writer.