Sometimes It's a Friend Who Becomes Your Horizon

This is Michael. He runs a reading series that introduces writers to a world beyond their constant terror that every stroke on the keyboard is hopeless and futile.

For eight years, he has sat in the front of every one of his reading and has never looked anything but interested and enthralled. Sometimes I think he actually is but really, who wants to take the risk to find out that might not be the case? I mean, what if he hates everything he hears and that includes your work?

So I sit way in the back, curled up in a cringe or stretched out in delight and marvel at the breadth and generosity, the ferocious commitment to all being heard, the elegance and the style that is Michael.