When I first moved down here in 1993 to be with the woman who would eventually become The Missus, among the things that excited me (as opposed to the things I dreaded) was her writing circle.

At the time, she was enrolled in a graduate creative-writing program. She had met numerous other writers through that program, of course, including two, Andrea and Donna, who would be her best friends for years afterwards. The Donna connection led to Clark, her S.O., who was also a writer (but not in the creative-writing program). Between one thing and another, then, I found myself — previously more or less alone in my writing, save for online friends — abruptly part of a small group whose members both loved writing and liked (eventually loved) one another.

It was an interesting mix. Andrea and Donna were both poets; in addition, Andrea wrote short stories, and Donna also wrote creative non-fiction and litcrit. Clark wrote horror and SF. The Missus, in her eyes, was “just” a fiction writer, but surprised herself (although not the rest of us) by writing killer poetry, too. And I wrote, uh, well, whatever it was — mostly fiction.

Everybody didn’t have something to workshop at each of our biweekly sessions, of course. Whoever was up next would have already distributed the story, poem, or whatever to the other members of the group. So we’d come armed with marked-up printouts — on the last page, always a paragraph or two of summary. The way it worked was that the writer of a given piece would sit there and just listen, not engage in back-and-forth, as all four readers gave their critiques. Then the writer could say whatever was on his/her mind. And then we’d do another writer’s work.

And then we’d have the rest of the evening to “socialize.” In my mind’s eye, although I know for certain that we shared meals on many of these occasions, what I really see is not food — not even drink (which there was always plenty of, too) — but the laughing faces and eyes of those four other people.

The Missus and I were talking about those times the other day — particularly about a debate she’d had with Clark about the movie The Piano. The exact nature of the debate (who took which side, pro or con, and what was the evidence mounted in each camp) isn’t important here. What’s important is the exquisite sense which just talking about it brought back to both of us, a sense of “what a time it was,” as Paul Simon sang. (To which Gus McRae, of Lonesome Dove, would add in the same spirit, “It was sooooome party, wasn’t it?”)

Over the years, other commitments called. A couple new members came in for a while, drifted away. And then things just sort of… evaporated. The Missus and I are still here but others have gone on to their own elsewheres (one of our original group even leaving the world altogether). Maybe this is the way such things always go. I don’t know, ’cause I sure hadn’t had such a thing before — and haven’t since.

Funny how much you can so quickly and profoundly become dependent on others — good others — not just for their help with your profession and craft, but for care and feeding of your soul. Luckily, in The Missus I’m still blessed with those.

But even after… after what is it? nine years? — yes, even now not a day goes by that I don’t see the faces of all four of them in my head: their laughter, their pulsating impatience as they waited for everyone else to finish so they could just explain what they meant, their knitted brows, and yeah, again: their laughter.