For a decade, I have watched myself be a backseat writer. I write plays and work on them for two years and then when the story has helped me process whatever unfinished business I needed to process or helped me swallow the residual shame I feel from this failed relationship or that unfulfilled dream, I pack these scripts away. My college thesis sits at the bottom of a filing cabinet I can't even get into anymore. My play that I had a reading of at a playwriting workshop through Voice and Vision, is crammed into a metal mesh file holder sandwiched between scripts I haven't looked at in five years. I have ten minute plays unsubmitted. Short stories abandoned. And now 80 pages of a memoir I am running from.
I blame the blog. I blame the wedding. And these are half truths. I am "happy" right now and don't really want to continue writing about a time where I suffered immense complex grief. Why write about how the night my parents decided to divorce was a scene that really captured the essence of them both? Why write about growing up in a one-bedroom apartment with my brother in a single-parent home? Why write about the deep regret I have for never accepting my grandmother's invitation to come over for tea? Why would I go back and sit in the shit, I think to myself, when I can write about Things I've Learned from Living in NYC and Tramp Stamp stories and things that are just fun? I stopped interviewing artists and finding my Tuesday Treats, even though I know the talks and writing the posts always inspired something in me. I stopped posting poems. I stopped getting too personal. I find it harder and harder to just write uninhibited. And then I ask myself, am I stuffing the script back in the file drawer? Will I delete this blog in the near future or abandon it entirely? I hear myself reminding myself, This was just a an experiment anyway. A year, remember? I feel myself losing steam. I feel myself running out of excuses. I feel the same old thing with this writing problem of mine. I don't always love to write and sometimes I hate it. But to not do it is inconceivable. To consider a life without writing is one I can't bear, even if it's writing about tattoos and wedding planning. But now I'm wondering if the blog is the obstacle? I still have another desk job where I can blog from, a job I tell myself would be perfect for a writer when I know a part of me doesn't consider blogging "writing" or at least not the kind of writing that I want to do in my heart.
I tell myself the blog is about connecting. Blogging is about connecting through writing. And I still believe that. And not just connecting with people but connecting with myself. It has also become a sort of truth meter for me and in some unfortunate cases an unintended weapon. In both cases, a great teacher. And for that I'm grateful. Maybe because of that, it's exactly what I should be doing.
So where does this leave me? I'm not quite sure. Maybe I need to get messy again. Shake things up. Write from the heart. Not look at the stats. Not follow my routine segments. I'm not sure what I need, but I know that I needed to write a post to get honest for a moment. If you're reading, thank you. And if you keep reading, thank you. I don't know where this blog is headed, but if you hold this thread, you may just watch it all unravel.
I tell myself the blog is about connecting. Blogging is about connecting through writing. And I still believe that. And not just connecting with people but connecting with myself. It has also become a sort of truth meter for me and in some unfortunate cases an unintended weapon. In both cases, a great teacher. And for that I'm grateful. Maybe because of that, it's exactly what I should be doing.
So where does this leave me? I'm not quite sure. Maybe I need to get messy again. Shake things up. Write from the heart. Not look at the stats. Not follow my routine segments. I'm not sure what I need, but I know that I needed to write a post to get honest for a moment. If you're reading, thank you. And if you keep reading, thank you. I don't know where this blog is headed, but if you hold this thread, you may just watch it all unravel.
2 comments:
engaging and thought provoking as always. blogging is like fast decompression/cheap therapy for me and your blog provides endless entertainment for me. keep it up! any way you do it, i am in.
ditto
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