Writing About Writing
Writing about writing is something I do a lot. Also writing about not writing. And reading about writing. And, much of the time, thinking about writing. Usually I think about the fact that, for a writer, I write precious little. This is a cause of great concern and anxiety for me. And, of course, concern and anxiety do nothing for my ability to do any writing.
For me, lately, the task of writing feels like opening the door on the Universe. It is large and fascinating and overwhelming and not a little scary. It is big and small and contradictory and ugly and breathtaking. My brain wants to make sense of it all, but cataloging an uncooperative Universe and attempting to put it in order is no small task and it certainly isn’t one that can be done by me or in my one little lifetime. Life, in short, is messy and I’m not sure where to dig my hand into the whole big mess and begin to pull stuff out.
When I was younger I could exist with a pretty phenomenal amount of clutter, but when my bedroom came to what I considered a critical point of chaos, I was compelled to clean in a manner bordering on obsessive. I started by taking everything and throwing it into the middle of the room, which resulted in a massive pile of stuff. Then I would start pulling things out of the pile, piece by piece, and putting them away. I often got side tracked. Putting a pair of clean socks in my drawer led to the cleaning out of said drawer before returning to the pile for the next item. Sometimes the room needed to be completely rearranged.
Initially, it was an exhilarating feeling, but I always hit a point in the middle where I was just overwhelmed. I had been working for hours and the pile didn’t seem any smaller. Nothing was taking shape yet, and I couldn’t really see an end in sight. I just wanted to give up, but there was this pile and something had to be done about it. It always took a long time, but was absolutely cathartic in the end. I didn’t want to leave my room for days after that, and I took extra care to put things away where they belonged. Inevitably chaos won out, as it always does. But then I just started over again. It hadn’t dawned on me yet to ask “What is the point if it’s just going to get messy again?” And if it did dawn on me, I wouldn’t have cared what the answer was, because it just felt good when I was all done.
Right now, with my writing, it feels very much like that tough middle stage where everything is overwhelming, you feel like you haven’t made any progress, and things look almost exactly the way they did when you first started. Which is kind of a revelation to me, because I’ve been beating myself up and feeling pretty poorly about where I’m at, and how, after all this time, it feels like I still haven’t really started. But really, it’s more like being in the middle than anything. And it’s always nice to discover (even if only momentarily) that you’re further along than you thought. Puts a little spring in your step, you know?
March 11th, 2005 at 2:21 pm
If you’re writing about writing, and writing about not writing, then you’re writing. That bit about how you used to clean your room is a story in itself. I’ll bet I’m not the only person who found that rather interesting. Every time you blog you’re writing. And, I, for one, enjoy reading it. It’s a little bit of whimsy for my day, and something I look forward to.
March 11th, 2005 at 3:52 pm
I happen to enjoy your writing and I’m glad that knowing you’re a little further along puts a “spring in your step” What’s funny is I can actually relate to the throw-everything-in-the-middle-of-the-room tactic for cleaning because that’s exactly how I do it!
March 20th, 2005 at 9:23 am
Love how your mind works and how you put it on paper.
March 21st, 2005 at 4:41 pm
Thank you for this - inspirational. I may even adopt your Big Pile method for my own much-needed spring cleaning.
Interesting thing about cataloguing the Universe…I think that the order is actually already there in the chaos…you just have to keep stealthily moving your viewpoint around it until the order becomes apparent (at least, this is how it works for me with the camera).
March 30th, 2005 at 11:10 pm
I’m trying not to go through your whole blog and read everything. Really, I am. Except I want to know how other writers deal with the edge of the cliff. Step One: Make a really, really BIG pile…
It has occurred to me on more than one occasion that the bigger the pile, the easier it is to step off the cliff. The drop is far shorter and far less scary, and socks make a very good landing spot.
Seriously, I’m so glad to read that I’m not the only one who ended up in the middle of a big pile in my room totally overwhelmed and reading every word of every printed item in the pile, just to be absolutely sure I knew what was in that pile. My mother has fond memories of wondering when I was actually going to surface from that pile and would there ever be a clean room at the end of it…
Thanks for yet again giving me a big smile on my face and a “me-too.”