scrrd
If you’ve been asking, “what the hell is up with you lately?” just take comfort in knowing you aren’t alone. I’ve been asking myself the same thing. Along with some other, related, questions.
I’m not writing outside of work again — but I don’t write that much at work any more, so that’s no longer an acceptable lame excuse. I ask myself why, but I always come up with some other lame excuse. It’s not that I’m too busy to write — I’m not. And it’s not that I’m always too exhausted to write — just sometimes. I think it’s fear. Feels sorta like writer’s block, but it’s writer’s terror. Kinda like how I developed some kind of microphone/stage fear — after having spent sporadic chunks of time enjoying loving the spotlight and maybe even the sound of my own voice, I eventually grew averse to being the center of attention in large crowds and/or hearing my own voice through speakers. It would take some serious preparation efforts to get me on a stage.
But my in own notebook? It’s odd, because for me to get scared it usually has to be something I a) don’t know about, b) think might likely end in bodily harm (which I guess is the same as a), and/or c) have no control over. Doesn’t really make sense though, because I know exactly what will happen if I can ever get a pen to paper. I will write a lot of crap; I will sort through things I thought I already dealt with; I will write about really inane, uninteresting stuff; I will write and write and write, and most of it will be shitty and I will never show anyone or, probably, reread it. I know that somehow through all that, I will feel better. And, I will be in control of the process.
So, I gotta wonder where this terror’s coming from.
(And even now I’m thinking I should hit “Publish” before I talk myself out of it. Or rather, into not doing it.)
