Paris Review – Philip Connors on ‘Fire Season’, Maud Newton →
I tended bar, fried donuts, unloaded semi-trailers at UPS, worked nights as a janitor at Kmart. The hours at those jobs tended to be terrible. I became estranged from the normal circadian rhythm. To have found a job that allows me to sit around looking at mountains, and even occasionally take a nap, seems to me an incredible piece of good fortune. There’s a line I like from Gertrude Stein: “It takes a lot of time to be a genius. You have to sit around so much doing nothing, really doing nothing.” I’m no genius, but I do love to sit around doing nothing. Even when you think you’re doing nothing, your mind can be at play in a way that’s ultimately useful if you’re a writer.
