The Five Strands of A Sedentary Empress

let's get real

"let's get real" 

It's the details that tend to throw me off course.

I mentioned before how I decided to write a fiction piece last summer, how I got so involved in it that I lost many an afternoon to typing away like a maniacal book nymph. I had convinced myself, early on, that this would be something I would not only finish, but might even publish, it was going to be that good. Cut to the end of the summer when I lost my interest in it and knew that if I had, everyone else probably would too.

It was the details, the way a writer is supposed to get things right that made me question the value of the story I'd started writing. I didn't know the names of streets in the area of the city I'd chosen. I didn't know if I should include any kind of current event because it would date the work, and I was pretty sure I needed to avoid assigning a time period. I didn't want to get into specifics because I felt like they would need to be one hundred per cent accurate, and for me, this made the whole thing seem less believable. I stopped, because it didn't seem worthwhile to continue, even though I still care what happens to the main character and all her little friends. I left them behind because my attention span had been exhausted, and they deserved better than that. I gave up, and I have to admit that I feel kind of sad about that.

I also hate writing dialogue. I can't write funny to save my life, and I think any good piece of writing needs even a little bit of humour. I also don't like writing profanity, because it's really, really uncomfortable for me given that I don't often speak that way in reality, and I can't bear the thought of getting too graphic about sex. Does this mean I'm not a good writer? Am I trying to control too much? Am I being untrue to my 'art'? Please. The thing is, I like sex a lot, but writing about it in detail is often unnecessary, in my opinion. There is a fine line between art and blatant pornography and I don't know that I could write about it in a way which would be beautiful.

I think my idea for the story was a good one, and if someone told me it was a plotline for a book or movie I'd probably be intrigued, but I'm not a complete fool, I know I'm not ready to call myself a writer. It stays hidden on my computer because it does not deserve to be read. I don't know that it ever will be.

I've always wanted to write a story about my grandparents and their experiences during the war. I started to, once, but the problem was that I didn't know much about what it was like to live in the early 1940's. I know the basics, like the fashion and the fact that things were fairly bleak, but how they spent their time, what kind of music they listened to, what it was like to walk down a city street before there was an explosion of people and cars. Also, I would have had to write my grandfather's point of view from a military angle, and even though I have all of his letters from that time, they don't give much detail about the conditions he was living in. Most of the time, he couldn't even say where he was, so I have to speculate as to which battle he fought in, in which country. It was too ambitious, too complicated for a twenty-first century girl with a short attention span, so I left it, but I still feel that tingling inside, the one which means I ultimately want to write it. Maybe one day I will get there, but I can't say for sure.

To write a book takes commitment, that's obvious, but more than that, the writer has to believe in it. The goal, also, must not be to get it published. It has to be a work built on love and ideas, not on the finish line. It has to unfold naturally, has to develop with patience and tender scrutiny and can never be written with the idea of pleasing everyone. That will never happen. All you can do is write something you personally would want to read, and hope someone else will recognize the same value in it that you do. I haven't read the 'Story of Edgar Sawtelle', but what impressed me about the writer, David Wroblewski, is that it was his personal project after work each night (he is a software developer), his activity for the dark hours and his hobby for the weekends. It became a lifestyle, a way of breathing, but he has said that he didn't know if it would ever become anything more than a stack of laser-printed pages on his desk. His subsequent fame is the result of passion and commitment to taking the story where he wanted it to go, and he went the distance. Aside from what I can only surmise is his obvious talent, what distinguishes him from me, and every other writer on this site who has great ideas but only half-written pages, is that he finished it. A first novel, internationally received and highly touted. I'd like to hate him but I can't help but admire him for keeping his head down and pushing the self-doubt away.

If I had a nickel for every time someone has said to me 'you could write a book!', I'd have a whole lot of nickels. The problem is that I don't find myself that interesting. I have no confidence that I could write something that other people would appreciate, and unfortunately, I do think about that when I am about to write. I'd like to write for me but I am all too aware that a writer's success depends on appeal, and I cannot shake the image of crumpled faces and shaking heads. I can appreciate the writers who write about their vampires with the homo-erotic tendencies because at least they seem to enjoy writing about them, and even if I think it's kind of boring, a lot of them have a gaggle of faithful readers who actually enjoy it. Also, they're doing it. They are writing and they are loving it and whether or not the subject matter is a little bit 'yesterday' for me, they are making an effort and that's admirable. Most of my writing is in this journal, and this is more of a way of purging and recording than actual wordcraft. Of course, it is something, and I have to admit that it's the one thing I do with some hint of regularity. I haven't written a poem in a while, either, and I should. I love poetry, I truly do, even if I don't know a lot about it. The thing is, when I write something and I like what I see, I feel like I've unlocked a secret. It's like one bit of my personality has finally risen, like cream to the top of the glass. So much about myself is confusing, but I never have doubts about how much I appreciate a decent poem.

I'll probably try again. The story, the poems, the rest of today.