A note from my editor

...possibly

Dear reader,

Semester is here. My life is over.

OK, so exaggeration. It’s not entirely over. The students are lovely; it’s like meeting a new and giant family of 400. I get to hang out with them each week, learn their names, work out their personalities and realise just how different they are from a cohort a year ago.

It’s fun, I’m grateful, I love the opportunity to connect and to facilitate their learning … but boy is it draining.

Each time I step into a workshop or lab, there’s a mask I’m wearing. At least, I think it’s a mask. The chameleon I house inside my body fluxes its chromatophores and I change into the skin that I need to wear. To put it another way, there’s a Nathan that walks into the room that isn’t the Nathan who walks home that night, the one who collapses onto the sofa, socially and emotionally spent.

This process of changing clothes, however it works, leaves me unsure of who is the real me. Perhaps I am all of these creatures. Perhaps I am none.

Why am I saying all this?

I don’t know really. I’m just making excuses. Buying time. Attempting to write something because writing has been a precious commodity I have barely enjoyed these last weeks and was the reason my last post was so late.

So, to steer myself back on track, I’ve taken a trip into the archives of SLAKE and pulled up a very old piece. Something short. One that I’m happy to say still makes me smile. I hope you enjoy. If you do, you know what to do. Sincerest thanks, and all that.

///

I do my best editing on the toilet.

That’s what my editor told me. Via text message. From a toilet.

We never speak on the phone, not anymore. Once he’d discovered the detrimental economy of text communication, he decided it wasn’t necessary.

Why the toilet? I wrote, unsure if I wanted to know the answer.

Because it’s quiet. No one interrupts you. There’s a certain peace to be had on a toilet.

His words continued, like we were having an actual conversation on the phone. When I thought we were done, I'd be alerted to yet another text.

It needs to be a good toilet.

A good toilet? I tapped out somewhat reluctantly, eyeing the last wisps of steam rising from my undrunk coffee.

The three dots informed a long reply was inbound.

Yes. Many factors. Natural lighting, clean (of course). White or blue tiles is ideal. Heated flooring an added bonus, though a shaft of sunlight through a skylight acceptable. Not cold, but also not hot. No air freshener, just natural air. Cosy, but not cramped and not too spacious. Do you know what I mean? There’s got to be a sense of place when you’re sat there.

I told him I’d never thought of toilets in such detail.

You should. It’ll change your life.

Change my life? I looked up. Had I been too unconcerned about toilets? In, out, done with. My usual routine. How many toilets had I passed through without any knowledge or consideration of form, layout, design? All of them, was the answer. My brain began to think of toilet architects and I couldn’t help but picture a scene of these men and women nodding and strolling from toilet to toilet within a gallery of toilets, uttering small approvals. Unable to stop myself, I imagined my editor at the centre. For some reason, he was cradling a large glass of Chardonnay.

I shook my head, aware that several minutes had past.

Do you have a favourite toilet? I ventured, unsure of why I was letting this go on.

Oh yes, many. I keep a log book.

A log book? More images and questions formed in my mind: Was the book touching his naked thigh as he scrawled away, or was it held in the air like some trophy? When visiting a public lavatory, would he wait for an empty cubicle to sit and jot within, or would he be content to rest on the sink as others washed and watched?

I decided I didn't want to ask, resolving to end the conversation. I moved away, but my phone soon vibrated. Sighing, I found myself drawn back.

The small Moleskine ones are the best, he continued, oblivious to my expression. Compact enough to remain in your pocket at all times.

At all times? This was becoming too much. My mind turned to those rare visits when, during the early stages of my literary career, we met in person. Had there really been a little notebook squished inside his pocket? At sixty, he must have accrued many such notebooks.

Then my mind recalled a visit he once made here. Somewhere within that notepad, would there be an entry from my own house?

Do you log every toilet you visit? I was typing, hating my fingers. I looked to my coffee and touched the cup. Lukewarm and ruined, I poured the contents into the sink.

His reply came an instant after I hit send.

Every one, he wrote.

But you also edit on the toilet? I asked, trying to steer the conversation back to where we had started—a piece I owed that was overdue for an online publication.

Most things. Smaller stories I’ll work on at my desk; longer pieces require a good toilet.

More questions emerged at his paradoxical response, but I had to stop this.

Look, I wrote, I have to go. I’m still shy of the word count and I can’t write with distractions.

At that, I turned off my phone. Whatever else he had to say could wait. I boiled the kettle and set about brewing another coffee.

Then I sat, staring once again at the empty page.

***

N—,

See changes. I’ve removed quotation marks. A bit livelier that way, don’t you think?

Call me.

—your editor.

Photo by Will Wright on Unsplash