Is This Thing On?

[Taps microphone.]

Hello? Can you hear me?

[Clears throat.]

Uh, hey there. Hi. My name's Sean. Sean Ingersoll. Technically, Sean-Scott Ingersoll and, um, this is my website.

[Awkwardly bumps microphone, winces at feedback.]

Sorry. Yeah, so a little bit about myself: Native Oregonian, born in the Cherry City (Salem), got an architecture degree in the Emerald City (Eugene), and now I live in the Nike City (Beaverton). I also went to kindergarten down in Medford for a year but I only have maybe three memories from that time, chiefly, being so small that my mom had to physically lift me onto the school bus because the first step was too tall for me to reach. I didn't break five feet tall until maybe March of my sophomore year of high school so that was awesome.

What else? Love soccer. I mean, I really, really love soccer. The simple act of kicking a ball has given me so much joy, so much connection, and probably equal parts frustration and despair. I know any fan would agree that eventually your team, club or squad will break your heart (some more than others) but the Beautiful Game is so integral to my sense of self that I can't imagine any version of Sean without it.

[Smiles awkwardly.]

So I wrote a book. Ironically, not about soccer, which would have made this a much more relevant introductory blog post about my debut novel, now that I think about it. [Shakes head.] However, there is a flashback early on in Writer's Retreat (that's my book!) with a youth soccer team practicing on a really terrible field and a photograph that is especially meaningful to the main character, Andy. But I digress.

My point--and I have one--is that soccer helped me fulfill my dream of writing and publishing a book...that is not about specifically about soccer. It goes like this: Back in seventh grade, wee little Sean is in the library at Parrish Middle School doing library stuff. Everybody in the hallways are bigger than me so the library was a bit less...daunting. For whatever reason, I have this junior high epiphany that it would be really cool to see my name on the spine of a book. I don't have a specific story or book I want to write in mind, just this dream to write something that could be in a library or bookstore. Time goes on, I play soccer through high school, I stop playing soccer after high school, and I get a Bachelor of Architecture degree from UO. As a part of the degree requirements for a BArch, we had to take non-architecture classes to be well-rounded. I took a few writing classes and I absolutely loved them. There was this creative writing class I took where we had to write two stories during the term, print them out for the whole class, and then get feedback as a part of the editing process. My first story, about a little kid sneaking off to visit his sick friend in a different neighborhood, was universally loved by the class. It was a class of thirty and I received no harsh criticism from anybody. I was very pleased. My second story was about an art student who killed his instructor and as I recall, almost everybody hated it. Write more stuff like the first story! somebody scribbled in the margins. Whatever. Mean comments aside, I loved creating something out of literally nothing and having people feel something about it.

More time goes on and I go back to playing soccer as an adult. Eventually, I start managing a men's Over-30 team in Portland and to spice up the team spirit, I started writing match summaries after each game, like what you'd read in the newspaper about a professional side. My team dug it and win or lose, my players would be excited to see the next team blog post. One of the guys on the team had a buddy who managed a website with dozens of soccer blogs about professional teams, players, etc. It was called The Offside. I met the guy, he dug my writing samples, and offered me a non-paying gig to write for my own blog on the site. My focus would be on the recreational soccer dad lifestyle, coaching youth teams, being a fan, etc. It was called The Weekend Warrior.

"Sean, we'd really like you to write two or three entries a day, maybe 500 words each, to build engagement with readers."

"I hear what you're saying, but I work like 55 hours a week doing architecture so what I'm thinking is that I'll write like an essay of 4000-5000 words whenever I feel like it."

"Uh huh, totally understand, Sean, but we'd really like to see shorter posts several times a day."

"Totally respect that, but I think I'm going to go in a different direction with the blog."

[Frustrated editor sigh.] "Whatever."

So for two years I wrote soccer blog posts whenever I felt like it. Some of them weren't terrible and once I got referenced by Soccer by Ives, who was a legitimate soccer journalist, so that was pretty cool. Writing The Weekend Warrior scratched the itch. Until it didn't. Eventually, I ran out of time and my blog posts were lucky to come out once every few months. My men's soccer team also fell on poor fortunes and writing about team losses was waaaaay less satisfying than writing about wins.

After some time, I realized I missed the words and at some point, my hand-printed Bucket List included #2. Write and Publish a Book. Yes, that would be a worthy life goal. Seventh grade Seanny would be so proud. I stopped and started several efforts, including a book about a recreational men's soccer team! (It was about soccer, but it was about more than soccer.) [Nods knowingly to himself.] But nothing ever stuck. Once, my hard drive fried and this new e-storage phenomenon called The Cloud didn't really back up my story like it was supposed to, so 100 pages were just lost. (That was not an awesome day.)

Fast forward to 2025. I'm playing with an Over 50 soccer team now and one of my teammates, Jason, mentions he also likes to write. I suggest we each write something, share the pieces with one another, and make comments. Keep each other accountable. Fully committed to this effort, I go out and buy a laptop that is just for writing. No work, just wordsmithing. An idea comes to mind and I start to go to work. Several months later, I email a PDF to Jason to get his thoughts. His reaction was very enthusiastic.

It was Writer's Retreat.

Which is not about soccer.

So here we are. My debut novel--that sounds really weird to finally say, but in a good way--is due to be published in a few weeks. The wonderful team at Luminare Press has been fantastic to work with through the entire process and when I got the final paperback proof copy a few weeks ago, I may have teared up a little. I definitely inhaled deeply of the pages to get that new book smell. Twelve years old, four foot six inch tall Sean would be so proud. He would also probably wonder when we went fully bald!

[Laughs nervously.]

Thanks for coming to my SEAN Talk.