There’s time to think during the forty minute drive, and time to prepare. I’m meeting with a young writer who has never written a word in his life, but wants to write a book. It happens like this, sometimes, and this time, I actually think he has a book to write. The death of his father, and the grief that followed calls to him to write. I’ve spoken with him twice about it, and I think he can do it.
The meeting room at the local coffee shop is occupied even though I have it reserved. The barista offers to ask the people to leave, but the young writer isn’t here yet, and neither is the other writer I invited to join us. She’s young, too, but her organizational skills and her knack for stories are needed here. I tell the barista the people can stay until my people arrive.
As I enter the room the two interlopers offer to leave, but I tell them they can keep working until my people show. I intend to write quietly but the man is a talker.
One of my favorite stories is me working in the garden when a man appears and wants to talk. I ask him if he’s a preacher or an insurance salesman, because those are the only two classes of people who will interrupt a man working in the yard. The guy stopping me in the garden was a preacher. He fled eventually.
This guy is both a preacher and an insurance salesman. His name is Mike. It’s too weird of a coincidence for me not to talk to him.
Mike has a ready stack of business cards that he fumbles and drops as he tries to hand them to me because I don’t reach for them.
“No thank you,” I tell him.
“They aren’t insurance card,” he assures me.
“No thank you,” I repeat.
“Oh. Okay.” And Mike is a little put off by my tone of voice.
His daughter is with him, and she never speaks a word. She’s young, high school maybe, but she doesn’t look at me, smile, or speak the entire time I’m there.
Mike doesn’t ask me what I’m writing but does ask what our group writes. This edges into AI because he knows preachers who use it. I tell him if you’re looking for an expected story from an audience who sees it coming, AI is perfect. But if originality is key, a writer, or a reader, can tell AI immediately.
“It has no soul,” I tell Mike, and he agrees but I can tell he’s a little unnerved by the idea AI is detectable.
Mike and his daughter are writing thank you notes to his insurance customers, and he does them all by hand, writing in cursive, and licking the stamps himself. “It’s a nice touch,” he says without a trace of irony.
My organized writer friend arrives, and Mike and his daughter pack their stuff. They were nearly through anyway.
We shake hands, but he’s not unhappy to get away from me. His daughter doesn’t speak. I tell my friend who they were and what they were doing, and she asks why I was in a small room with a preacher, and no one left pissed off.
I’m civil to anyone who will allow me to be. Neither Mike nor his daughter were pushy or rude, and most importantly, they didn’t waste my time, which I cannot tolerate. Mike had something to do in that room, I had no reason to interfere, and we were able to have a decent conversation about a subject that will trouble us both.
I think Mike has no time to waste, either, and likely he’s got to get ready for a sermon this weekend, and find something to write about. I hope I have helped him as much as he helped me.
Take Care,
Mike
