Kevin Smith Smells like Comic Books
I think we all can.
All week, I’ve been playing MC for Author Nation—a huge, wonderful author conference that happens in Vegas each year. Formerly called 20Books Vegas, this year the show had my friend Joe Solari at the helm. In an experiment and an evolution, he and his team steered a massive ship with a coffee stirrer. I call the show a success, and I’m honored I got to play a role it in. I’ll be back.
It’s kind of wonderful to be in a place filled with your people. Your community. Your tribe. Your family. There are a lot of terms to cover the concept, but they all mean the same thing.
You’re home. Even though you’re away from home.
I was doubly blessed at this one, because not only was I among my tribe, I also got to spend time IRL (that’s “in real life,” if you’re not youthful and hip like me) with my Writers, Ink Podcast family—JD Barker, Jena Brown, and Christine Daigle. And, wonderful bonus, our rotating co-host James Blatch was there, as was our show’s editor, Alex Groesch. I don’t think there have ever been so many of us gathered in one spot at the same time. And it was both comforting and special to hang out with them all week. Made it feel like I had allies here.
Though, really, I wouldn’t have had to spend any one minute alone this whole week, given the reception I got. I couldn’t get more than a few feet along in the corridor to the exhibition hall before someone called my name and stopped me for a chat. I had people come to me all week for photos, to tell me they love the Wordslinger Podcast, to tell me they love Writers, Ink, or just to chat me up about my books. At least twice I had people say they recognized me by my voice alone. Now that’s very humbling and heartwarming.
I have a lot of highlights from this trip. I’ve had some incredibly special moments with some amazing people. And one of the biggest was the chance to smell Kevin Smith.
Last night we were all treated to “An Evening with Kevin Smith,” who took the stage to share slices of his life. Funny stories, for sure, but buried in the jokes was some advice, and a philosophy, that I think every writer, in fact every human being needs to know.
When his talk was done, I was one of the first people at the microphone, waiting to ask a question. When I got my chance, Kevin came around the podium to stand closer to me, from the stage.
“Ah, I can almost smell you from here,” I joked.
That’s all the opening a Kevin needs.
In the next moment he was on the floor and standing inches from me, leaning in so I could take in the aroma.
He smelled of comic books.
It was a surreal and fun and funny moment, but it gave me something I’m not even sure he realized would be so meaningful to me.
I got to look him directly in the eye, inches away from me, and tell him, “One of the things I admire about you, that actually inspires me about you, is that your whole life you’ve looked at the things you thought were fun, and that you wanted to do, and you just went and did them.” And then my question, “Do you still have dreams left?”
Turns out he does. He talked about those dreams for the next ten or fifteen minutes he talked about those dreams, and his philosophy of dreaming. It... went a little long, I’ll confess. I started feeling bad for the rest of the folks, who had questions they wanted to ask. But for all that time he talked straight to me, looked right at me, answered me.
It’s not like we bonded and swapped stories and became friends. That would have been cool. But it’s tough to pull that off in a situation like this.
More importantly, though. it gave me a moment. The face-to-face was captured in photos and video. My jokes got to share the air with his jokes. And, best of all, I captured a thought.
In life, the way you live into the dream is you don’t stop dreaming, and you don’t stop asking. If you see something that excites you and pleases you and delights you, if you look at what others are doing and say, “I could do that. I want to do that,” then it’s up to you to go and do it. And, when you’ve done it, win or lose, succeed or fail, look for the next thing that excites you and go do that, too.
Kevin Smith doesn’t always succeed. Except...
He’s made movies. He’s made TV. He’s written comics. He’s stared on screen. He’s met his heroes. He’s made a living by literally just being who he is. He saw all these things, asked himself if he could do them, answered with “Of course, why not?”
And then he went and lived into it.
If he can, I can. If I can, you can.
We can all smell like comic books.
My first and biggest dream...
I write. It’s what I do. Have done, all my life. I’ve had a lot of jobs and careers, and pursued a lot of the dreams that inspired me. But writing and publishing... that’s the core of who I am.
You can support me and keep me going when you tell the people in your life about my books. Send them to https://kevintumlinson.com/books, and tell them to let me know that YOU sent them.
A Note at the End
I do a lot of trips like this, though I’ve slowed down on the author conference circuit a bit since leaving Draft2Digital. I’m still thrilled to be invited to speak or to host or to simply be a guest. I love hanging out with other writers—you learn things. Usually not about writing or the business, but there are plenty of juicy life stories here in the trenches.
This conference is my favorite. And, weirdly, over the years it’s had the biggest impact on my career out of all the conferences I attend. I have journal entries from over the years, moments where I fought exhaustion to sit and write in my room. In fact, of all the conferences, this is the one where I actually get the most writing done, despite being so busy. I think the fact that there’s a two hour time difference for me, and I’m already an early riser, motivates me to do something productive before I go hang out with everyone.
But according to those years of journal entries, I often have little inspired moments at this thing. The sort of moments that get me to commit to something I’ve hesitated over, or get me excited about what I’m doing again.
This is one of those.
It has almost nothing to do with meeting Kevin Smith. That was just bonus. But spending time with my podcast team, spending time with longstanding friends from the business, and hearing from people who find what I create and build to be inspirational and motivating... that has filled me with an absolute demand to move forward and embrace this new era of my life and career.
That, alone, is worth coming to Vegas each year.
I love that. My husband smells like comic books. I dare say our house would smell like comic books if I didn't keep the Febreeze handy. He has close to 20,000 stashed away in mylar bags and long boxes. I have the small closet in one bedroom to myself. The master bedroom closet and the large walk-in closet off the entry way are both stacked - floor to ceiling - with those boxes. His office has the walls lined with those boxes so there is only room for his desk and chair. I have become deeply acquainted with the contents of those boxes over the years, although I am not allowed to remove any from their bags. Instead, he has told me the stories, and when the movies came out, it was like watching the director's cut because he could explain the backstory of ever character. I could call him a nerd, but I can do the same thing with the Lord of the Rings movies.