My greatest dream in life is to perfect the art of grilling. Unfortunately, I am the winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, and no one ever wants me to talk about my grilling.

Did you know grilling was invented by the Arawak tribe of the Caribbean in the seventeenth century? These are the kinds of facts I would share if anyone ever asked. Instead, reporters ask me where I’d place myself in the feminist canon as confetti falls from the ceiling, which has nothing to do with grilling.

Grilling is an art that requires superhuman concentration, but I can’t grill one lousy corn cob without some passing rando asking “Hey, aren’t you Nobel laureate Kimmy Rogers? Your book changed my life! I got sober because of you.” I look up for one second, and when I look down, poof, the corn’s charred beyond recognition.

The second book I ever wrote won the Nobel. Can you believe my luck? Now I am never writing another book again. My first book was a compilation of three-hundred and fifty-seven variations on ham hock. It sold moderately well. I was proud of it. Then I went and did something stupid. I tried something new and wrote a literary epic about intergenerational trauma that won the Nobel Prize.

Now they make me stand behind polished cedar podiums, like some sick joke—wood like that belongs on a grill, not under a Nobel laureate—and pose for author photos on the press tour. I smile with all my teeth and none of my heart. I sneak out at 3 a.m. to grill flank steaks in the hotel parking lot, just to feel like myself again in between book signings.

My only real fan is Triple Baste George, who lives in Kansas. Last week, he emailed me a photo of a finished ham hock from the early days. #329. I cried tears of joy. He’s a real one, from the good old days. Life was good then. Grilling was good. It was the spring of ’98, and I had just figured out how to make the perfect mesquite. There was music in the air, and you could taste the promise of chicken thighs crisping when the skin puffs up just so—I’m going to stop writing before this wins another stupid Nobel Prize in Literature.