Is There Anybody Out There? Just Nod If You Can Hear Me.

Although some people don't think you should make yourself sit down at your computer and blog everyday just because you adhere to some ill-concieved self-imposed weekly quota, I feel like I've got to keep at it.  I worry that if I take too long a break I may never come back to it again. 

This person also thinks that People don't care about your opinion so much as how you express it.  And Sloppiness as an aesthetic is okay, but you can't get too lazy with your diction and syntax. The well-turned phrase is your biggest strength.

I could die here at this computer -- rigamortis could set in with my right thumb attempting to hit the space bar yet one more time, trying in vain to bang out a well-turned phrase.  Am I not supposed to hit "save" after I've suffered through two hours of trying to write some piece of pixelated dribble just because my diction and syntax are down on the couch under a blanket taking a nap?

I wish I were really comfortable in front of this screen.  But most times I'm not.  I've got ideas swimming around in my head 24 hours a day, but when I try to get them out on this keyboard I most times drown in a sea of self-doubt.

I just read Joan Didion's account of her husband's death in the NYTs.  She and her husband, John Gregory Dunne, both being writers, carried around little index cards at all times to make quick notes of ideas they would have, so nothing could be forgotten.  Her husband told her once that making those notes and keeping those cards actually made a writer a good writer.

I have a ton of faith in the trip I'm making to the drug store tomorrow.  It could be a life changing experience.  Mr. Dunne's death may hold a deeper meaning for me -- she wrote not sarcastically at all and thinks you're really mean to even think she would.

Because if those little index cards that I'm intent on buying tomorrow don't work, I fret I'll be suffering from this anguish for years and years to come.  And I really trust John Gregory Dunne.  Afterall, all really good writers use their full name like that.

Anne Lamott, one of my favorite writers -- also obsessed with the whole index card thing --describes what I suffer from in Bird by Bird:

Most of my students want to know why they feel so crazy when they sit down to work, why they have these wonderful ideas and then they sit down and write one sentence and see with horror that it is a bad one, and then every major form of mental illness from which they suffer surfaces, leaping out of the water like trout -- the delusions, hypochondria, the grandiosity, the self-loathing, the inabilitiy to track one thought to completion, even the hand washing fixation, the Howard Hughes germ phobias.  And especially, the paranoia.

You can be defeated and disoriented by all these feelings.

I loved reading that.  Misery loves company after all and just imaging that so many people feel the same way is giving me the energy to tap these letters out, one after the other, right here, right now.

Lamott suggests you take all that mental illness, that anguish and nausea and work it out through words.  Get your creative juices flowing.  Use that insecurity and shape it into something true and funny or ...frightening.

To illustrate her point, she normally reads aloud a poem by Phillip Lopate, that goes:

We who are

your closest friends

feel the time

has come to tell you

that every Thursday

we have been meeting,

as a group,

to devise ways

to keep you

in perpetual uncertainty

frustration

discontent and

torture

by neither loving you

as much as you want

nor cutting you adrift.

Your analyst is

in on it,

plus your boyfriend

and your ex-husband;

and we have pledged

to disappoint you

as long as you need us.

In announcing our

association

we realize we have

placed in your hands

a possible antidote

against uncertainty

indeed against ourselves.

But since our Thursday nights

have brought us

to a community

of purpose

rare in itself

with you as

the natural center,

we feel hopeful you

will continue to make unreasonable

demands for affection

if not as a consequence

of your disastrous personality

then for the good of the collective.

When Lamott is done reading her poem meant to inspire creativity, she notes that a few of her students...

...look at me with actual disgust, as if I am standing there naked under fluorescent lights.

Talk about a well-turned phrase.  I may have written quickly:  They looked at me sharply as if I had lost my mind.

Naked under fluorescent lights is way more "show, don't tell."  A phrase I quickly grew tired of in my writing classes last Spring.

Which brings me to the end of this post. 

Some people also say:  Self deprecation is ill suited for someone as intimidating and intelligent as you are.

But I'm not too worried about that rule.  There's no way he could be talking to me.

Comments

[res publica]

Lord, that was good. You and your "good writing", making the rest of us look like jerks. In all seriousness, though, an amazing post. I loved "Bird by Bird", and also "Traveling Mercies".

[stebbijo]

Whew -- that was heavy!

I remember the days of the index cards and the writing I would deliver from them. Damn that brother of mine for throwing them on the floor!

[blue girl]

Res, I just finished "Traveling Mercies." I love her!! As I got closer to finishing it I started reading slower -- cuz I didn't want it to end!

Thanks for stopping by Stebbijo -- it wasn't "meant" to be heavy -- just a way to use that cool poem! Happy Birthday -- hope it was a good one!

[dorsano]

I'm nodding Blue Girl.

[Jedmunds]

I don't feel comforable typing on my computer either. I dream of buying a laptop, so I can lay in bed and lazily blog. I have such a hard time concentrating at a desk.

Anyway, good post.

[Lance Mannion]

I actually blog on paper using a paper. Then I hand the stuff to my secretary to type into the computer. I write by candlelight too and ride a horse to town.

Index cards? Never thought of that. I carry a pocket notebook everywhere. I don't carry a pen everywhere, which makes having the notebook useless, except that it looks cool peeking out of my pocket. Not as cool as a pocket protector full of pens but still.

Plus, anybody who creates an image of herself standing naked under fluorescent lights deserves to be stared at as if she's standing there naked under fluorescent lights.

[Jedmunds]

Also with my post, I was just trying to make my blog better you know, not provide a template of universal application.

And as far as the intelligent and initimidating bit, come on, you're like whiskers on jackals and raindrops on habenero peppers.

[ProgressiveDepot]

Isn't the intense struggle to write the mark of a good writer? If it was easy, everyone would do it. (Well, I guess these days everyone does, but not necessarily well.)

[Simon]

A few things about writing and your blog:

1) No-one is an expert, they just *think* they are.

2) Each writer's voice is unique, and that's what makes everyone intersting, so use your own and syntax and diction and let the naysayers be damned.

3) If you sit down and write everyday simply for the sake of writing you are *practising your craft*. You don't learn to write by not writing.

4) Besides all that, I've never read anything here that wasn't already well-thought out and well-written.

You're already a great writer, and the personal humanity that shines through in your posts is why I have you bookmarked. If I wanted to read a newspaper for impartial and unimpassioned 'news of the day' I would. I'd much rather see it filtered through Human Eyes.

[blue girl]

Thanks Simon. That was nice of you to write that...

Made my day!

[Phaedra]

Wow! What a poem and blog post. You have nailed all the insecurities a writer feels when sitting alone in the dimly lit privacy of the home office. I tend to not think of writing for anybody else, but myself. It's not that I'm selfish or arrogant, it's just that if I thought of everyone who might read what I write, I would be paralyzed and never able to write another word. So, I remain, blissfully oblivious.