I went back into the older stories and reworked them, because I became a better writer over the years and could spot flaws. I loved having another chance to make them stronger, and to bring them closer to me, made them less like a greatest hits compilation, and more like something written in the same extended burst.

I tend to listen to my friends and family empathetically, and I try to help work through their problems from the inside. I try to adopt their thinking.

I think the second, or outsider's, perspective can come as you layer a story. It's as though you've grabbed a secondary character and asked them, "What do you make of this guy?" and the hope is that the answer surprises you as the writer.

Of course I'd sometimes have characters from downstate living upstate, but it took a while for me to start writing about where I grew up.

I'm always relearning things I thought I'd learned for good a while back.

When I teach, I try to assign writers from whom I can learn.

I'll write about California someday, I imagine, but I don't know when.