Swimming with the Words

How did it feel to Get Lit at the Beach after postponing the event for three years? Like refueling an empty tank, breaking a long fast, or coming up for air? The experience merits more than snappy similes.

Get Lit was launched in 2012 as an annual spring gathering for readers. The behavior that unites us can be labeled a craze, profession, or calling. We explore the high seas of thought by staring at strings of letters for hours on end. Some bookaneers turn pages while wearing ruffled sleeves, especially if talk of literature is afloat.

Our proclivity came in handy during the pandemic. Books can be strong medicine to counter the loneliness and boredom that arise from social isolation. Readers who returned to Get Lit were hankering for fellowship. Can such celebrations halt the spread of insanity, expand our chance at intellectual pursuits?  

Guest authors helped me believe in this possibility. Picture a whale-like refreshment of breath through the head, ye old mind blown with oxygenated ideas. A big fluky salute goes to Omar El Akkad, Lyanda Lynn Haupt, Elise Hooper, and Lauren Kessler (in alphabetical order). Wondrous spouts of insight from these masterful writers raised my hopes for literacy writ large.

Absence makes space for perspective, creates to gestate understanding. The significance of events can become blurred by routine, so that we’re going through the motions without continuing to see meaning in what happens. It’s like my springtime commute to the bookshop, driving north along the coast as giant brainy beings swim the same direction. My workaday world exists in tandem with this miraculous migration, yet sometimes I barely even notice the whale-watching signs. 

Placards do help, same as badges clipped to lanyards and lots of other important things like functioning microphones. Over the weekend our support crew made sure folks could get to know each other on a first name basis. Workers equipped our capacity for an easygoing in-person gnosis that’s so much larger than the sum of us. 

Thus it happened during the first morning session that Lyanda invited participants to shed our indoor conventions, venture out with open senses in search of inspiration. She spoke of the dysphoria humanity suffers due to our disconnect from nature. To help relieve this stressful schism she suggested going barefoot, as God advised Moses near the burning bush. Her lamblike sharing of mountain-top truths had me wanting to fill the quiet conference room with amens. I acted on this impulse, just a peep, though as she spoke my soul roared.

Elise then told us how she met the trailblazing women who inhabit her books. Her smile was so radiant that I felt a little exposed as I spoke with her up close. When asked following her talk to predict the next wave of feminism, Elise disclaimed the role of prophet. Then she reminded us that society still rides the same cresting need for equity and inclusion. Suddenly I could look straight at the raw strength of sisterhood, fully appreciate that shine from a confident star.

A book-skirted shaman ushered us further into wisdom after lunch. Lauren bore witness to the creativity of prison inmates who enrolled in her writing workshops. Her testimony showed how people who get caught for serious crimes can go on to become pioneers of redemption. To conclude her talk Lauren read from a work in progress about a 500 mile pilgrimage she made on foot. For me her words about the journey also conveyed a feeling of deliverance from bondage.

Omar keynoted our Saturday evening banquet. He began by outlining his personal odyssey from Egypt to Qatar to Canada to Oregon. No doubt I wasn’t the only member of the 99% white audience who felt humbled by his stories of hardships that often seem distant when viewed from inside the United States. His compassion and gentle humor helped buoy our awareness of crucial themes, shifted our perspective so we could relate to global tragedies on more familiar terms.

Many writers dream of being as widely read as these bestselling authors, who during the Sunday session confessed to the fantasy of becoming famous songwriters. To illustrate how moved I was, listening to them speak, I’ll compare their work to beloved vocalists from the 60s and 70s. Imagine if Kate Bush, Joni Mitchell, Dolly Parton, and Patti Smith appeared together on stage. By the end of Get Lit I felt like I’d just attended that kind of gathering.

Terry Brooks conducted this literary concert, holding an invisible wand he claims is just a spaghetti noodle (fans know otherwise). He makes the magic looks simple, yet it works because his downhome ease is coupled with genuine refinement. Terry’s standing is anchored in the fact that for decades he motivated more readers of fantasy than any other wordsmith on the planet. There’s no way we could secure the guest authors we do if not for Terry. He’s our Carol King.

Yet the value of this event can’t be pinned on celebrity. From the beginning of Get Lit Terry and his wife Judine have helped make sure that everyone feels comfortable. It’s a friendly space where guests aren’t tasked with any particular topics and can speak about whatever they want. No writing workshops weight the mix. Readers spend the weekend making friends, assured they can just be themselves and won’t have to review drafts of submitted writing.

At most events of this kind authors speak for a while to fellow readers who then cue up to buy books and get them signed. If the line isn’t too long there’s a chance for producer and consumer to speed-chat. Then we go our separate ways in a world that’s increasingly defined by quick transactions. By contrast, Get Lit offers folks plenty of time to visit, to integrate our mutual love for words in a way we dearly missed during Covid lock-downs.

Here’s a little exchange that illustrates how this kind of camaraderie surrounds Get Lit. While I was setting up to sell books at the event one year, a hotel worker paused to briefly look over my inventory. He became animated when he spotted a book that featured a big name on the cover.

“You know Terry Brooks?” he asked.

I nodded and assured him the world-famous author would be available throughout the weekend to sign books.

“Oh, I don’t read,” he said. “Terry and Judine are just good people. We have lots of great talks whenever I serve them at the restaurant.”

It may sound strange, coming from a bookseller, but that interchange affirmed I was in the right place. All literature springs from the reciprocal gifting of words, whether this happens through writing or speaking or physical gestures.

The fellow claimed he didn’t read, but we were reading each other just fine in the moment, moving in the flow that keeps us human.