Essay: Woman on Assignment
How writing undercover helped me circumvent shyness
Before I forget, you’re invited to a special writing workshop with me—Tender Brutalities: Writing the Beautiful and Grotesque. Together, we’ll learn how to move out of cliché and into the strange and evocative territory of terrible beauty. Learn strategies for writing that is both sting and salve.
Tuesday | December 17th | 5pm PST
Register and find all the details here.
For as long as I can remember, I’ve been terrifically shy. I didn’t know I was shy. I just thought I was seven, then eight, and then nine. And at some point, I assumed I would grow into an adult that no one could describe as bashful.
But the timidity persisted.
I suppose a good bit of my social anxiety came from a childhood spent intensely isolated. As a child of medical missionaries in Central African Republic, I grew up devoid of technology and much social connection. Through many of my formative years, I was bone dumb lonely and my peers were as perplexing to me as I was to them.
My hair was the color of corn, bleached nearly white from the sun, and my eyes—a bizarre shade of blue. The African children from our neighboring village rightly saw me as a stranger, white person, or mzungu, twisting my skin into little red welts—exclaiming, white, no pain.
In the village, there were old stories of ghosts who appeared at dusk. Once, when walking home through the jungle, I startled a grown man so badly, he fell down. How strange I must have looked to him, a small translucence cutting through the shadows. My face floating by like an unsteady moon.
We moved. And we moved again. And by the time we finally returned to the U.S., my sense of separateness felt permanent. Shyness swallowed me alive like a forest cobra. At school, I often snuck paper bag lunches into the bathroom stall, shoes tucked up on the porcelain rim. The children in Ohio didn’t twist my skin anymore, but they pinched in other more ferocious ways.
For most of my teen life, I made my sisters put in my coffee orders. I dreaded the awkwardness of pumping gas in front of strangers. I was somehow always afraid of getting it wrong. For the gig to finally be up. For everyone to know I somehow wasn’t where I was supposed to be.
As an adult, I still sometimes hide out in the bathroom at parties. I psyche myself up to approach the bartender and order a drink. When people began recognizing me at parties after my first book, I started carrying little custom pins to press into their hands—mostly so I would have something to say.
Research suggests that sensitive temperament in babies and children is one of the top indicators of shyness in adults. It appears as if us shy folks are always wincing from the world but still desperate to touch it. This might also be the definition of a poet.
Just about a year ago, I began this essay series, Woman in the World. I wanted to work in the essay form, and I especially wanted to challenge myself to discover new experiences that I might be otherwise too timid to try.
Each month, I take myself to a new place, metaphorical or literal. The rules are simple—the assignment must be something 1). I feel shy about completing and 2.) has to feel productively complicated to write about.
Over the course of the project, I’ve taken myself all over: to rage rooms, horse ranches, safaris, parfumeries, dance studios, reiki tables, tarot readers, cuddle parties. If I get too nervous, I use an alias—Thursday Jones. To this day, I still get a little thrill watching the barista writing Thursday on the coffee cup in black sharpie cursive.
Over the course of the Woman in the World project, I’ve also discovered things I wasn’t into. I was dramatically humbled when I tried to learn triple step east coast swing. I discovered that I’m terrible at throwing clay and that I still hate karaoke. And when I went to the erotic film screening, Humpfest, I learned that my kink is never doing that again.
But many of my assignments have become permanent passions. I now dance twice a week, have forged new thought patterns via frequent energy work, and often gift my friends custom fragrances from the local parfumerie. Internally, I feel my shyness easing too. I’m less intimidated by big groups. I have better stories to tell at parties. I say “yes” often and easily. And I’ve found a consistent way to beat that persnickety writer’s block.
I’ve discovered that inhabiting the world as a journalist is a gift. This will always be the joy of writing. A chance to inhabit a different trajectory, to sketch, freehand a different fate for yourself. Whenever you need a rush of courage, turn yourself into Thursday Jones. Do it for the plot, for the punchline, for the goddamn pinch.
December’s Field Assignment: Museum of little shynesses
Every month, I send paid subscribers out on their own life assignment. Then we share our writing in a private thread just for paid subscribers. I’ve adored reading your work last month. Find December’s prompt below. ↓
As a paid subscriber, you also get access to all my writing workshops (including the instant replays of past ones).