Guest Blog with Seth Schultz

(Seth Schultz came up with the title for my newest book. I interviewed him a couple of years ago here. And I wrote a blog entry about him here.)

Hanging out with Brad is an interesting thing. The man's mind is always at work brainstorming new ideas and fine tuning his current writing projects. There is a level of precision in his writing that, as a slacker, I just don't get. But as a thinker I absolutely love. It is easy to get caught up in the process and want to throw your own ideas out just to participate.

Most of the time I would come up with half joke ideas. I am not a bizarro reader or writer, but I can come up with good ideas. On the rare occasion I come up with one Brad like he usually encourages me to use it and write something. But no, I am a slacker. When I came up with “Sorry I Ruined Your Orgy,” I happily let him use it.

It is a powerful title I must admit. Regret, destruction, and taboo sex in five words. I actually did go to a sort of orgy thing in the past. It was college, I was a sort of mini cult-leader/celebrity at the time and I knew some interesting people. But there is nothing quite like being a shy, physically and emotionally awkward man in a house full of mostly rambunctious, beautiful lesbians I had crushes on. It wasn't like a 70s porn orgy. I went, had a good time, hung out with awesome people while naked. Still, there is a particular human pain one experiences when feeling unwanted chastity around so much sensuality. Being self conscious of your unwanted self restraint. Knowing that by being chaste you are kind of killing the vibe. I think Leonard Cohen even wrote about how much shy people at orgies suck.

So yeah, that's where the idea came from. I kind of distilled it into something most people can recognize, then gave it to Brad, who let it blossom into the piece in his book, which I think also conveys that strange energy well.