I know it don’t thrill you; I hope it don’t kill you.
Late this summer, I discovered the university library to be an ideal place to work. Its peculiar off-season emptiness pleased me; the place was near-silent except for the occasional off-color exchange between bored summer employees and constant dark hiss of the a/c. All of this contributed to the illusion that I wasn’t really supposed to be there, or moreover, like no one would ever find me there, which made it the perfect place to write.

I like doing work under the illusion that I’m getting away with something, and I like to work at places and times that encourage that belief—a local diner in the wee morning hours, a crowded coffee shop, abandoned classrooms or the departmental office no one ever uses early on a Friday evening, anything to encourage the idea that what I’m doing isn’t work, but some sneaky pleasure.

So I blame my current block on the return of the students to town. I sit and look at these shoddy, rambling, absolutely no-holds-barred first drafts I cranked out in those days of what felt like writing splendor, and have no idea where to cut or how to fix them. And how, and how-! they desperately need it.

And I can’t face them now, not in these days of rapid repopulation by the baseball caps and cellphones and George Hamilton tans. And it’s not just the undergrads. Knowing that my own colleagues are coming back to town feels just as paralyzing. “Go away!” I think when I see their friendly faces and field their friendly Hi-How’re-yous, even in my mind. (Everyone that is, except you, Henshaw.)

Everyone, all this humanity, returning and wresting the town’s character back with it, from weird little beachtown to collegetown once again. And bringing the expectations I knew would befall this experience eventually, with it.

Welcome back to the schoolyear, Henshaw. The very last one.