Parent of Adults Launch Report

How the newsletter debut has gone

Photo credit: team voyas

I love to hear why and how writers and other creative people/artists do their work. They’re just regular people, after all. And creative work never happens in a vacuum; the stuff going on in the background is as much a part of the work as the actual words or paint splotches or whatever.

This is the animating spirit behind offering a periodic glimpse behind the curtain

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of my writing practice. Every so often I’ll devote an issue of Parent of Adults to tools, habits, musings, and other writing meta-topics, plus whatever writerly news I have to share.

In this metaphor, I am both Toto and the wizard. Image source: GIPHY

In this first dispatch, I thought I’d share what the Parent of Adults launch has been like.

If you’re reading this you’re one of my earliest subscribers, so in a way we co-launched this newsletter.

Going from zero to one is the hardest part

For me, the hardest part of any new writing project is pressing “publish.” I can float around in the universe of ideas for months, writing fantasy essays and articles, designing fantasy websites, constructing fantasy social media strategies.

It’s so nice and floaty up here! Anything can happen! No gravity! No rules! In other words, no accountability! No risk!

(I wrote about my tendency to overthink in November 2019. Re-reading it breaks my heart a little because the person who wrote it had no idea what January 2020 had in store, and was about to learn a painful lesson about the risk that comes with inaction. But that’s another story.)

Turning my fantasies into concrete projects requires coming back down to Earth, putting my butt in my chair

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, and producing something. Given this, the Parent of Adults launch has been a rousing success, because this newsletter exists. It’s out in the world!

Beyond that, the response to Parent of Adults has gone way beyond my expectations. The enthusiasm has been like an updraft lifting me higher every week.

Much of that energy is good, old-fashioned friend-and-family support, and let me tell you, it’s wonderful. I’m in a great position of starting this newsletter after having written online in one form or another for over 17 years, so when I invited people I know to subscribe, they had a good idea what they were getting into and said yes.

But there’s more to it. Folks I’ve never met before are subscribing. In the comments of the launch post, Erin observed, “I feel like very few others write about this phase.” I launched this newsletter hoping it would address a need that’s out there (a need I have myself). Early indications are good.

A celebratory moment

Here’s another cool thing that happened: Parent of Adults showed up on Substack’s Top Parenting Publications leaderboard less than two weeks after it launched!

Giyen and me

I’m embarrassed to even admit this mattered to me. But it did. As my friend (and fellow Substack writer) Giyen said, “I think when we tell the universe that we want something and it happens, we need to celebrate and be grateful about it.”

Of course she’s RIGHT. I’m so grateful for whatever magic brought us here.

How you can help

Finally, THANK YOU to those of you who’ve invited friends to subscribe! Part of why I made Parent of Adults free to read is so you could pass it along to friends without feeling like you had to sell something.

Word of mouth is the best way for a quality community to grow, so I extra-appreciate your shares, especially at this early stage. If you’re enjoying it here so far, consider inviting your friends to sign up for a free subscription.

1. Not that the curtain hides much! It’s relatively sheer and frayed at the edges, and what’s behind it is pretty straightforward. But you get the point.

2. “Keep your butt in the chair and your head in the game” is the closing exhortation of the excellent #AmWriting Podcast co-hosted by Jessica Lahey and KJ Dell-Antonia.