July 10, 2005
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I’m taking a break today, from the book I mean. Who would have thought writing could be so — I don’t know — destructive. I guess I thought shedding light would be a positive thing. I sure never thought writing a sex scene would be so complicated. I laid in bed last night ready to scrap the whole idea. Writing fiction, unless you’re really an accomplished writer with an over-active imagination, is almost a waste of time. Writing semi-autobiographical stuff is more interesting to people but the toll it takes on the writer hardly makes it worth the effort. My third book is a biography, more or less, and maybe that would be easier but I don’t want to go back to that, just yet.
I guess we’re supposed to be taking another kind of break here, a day of silence. And, as you know, I’m the least political person on here. Unless you mention it, I probably won’t know what’s going on in the world. Ever since the dog ate my remote control I haven’t turned the TV on and since I quit looking for a job I don’t get the newspaper anymore. Shocking, huh.
I do believe that the thing to do here is not to be silent today. I would hope that we could continue to reach out to people, especially through the Internet where we can easily converse with people from other countries, and share our lives until there is no more sense of mine and yours. One day we will visit there and they will come here and it will all be ours. And I do believe it is up to people like you and me to make it happen. I want to learn Spanish and go to Uruguay. And I met a young man in Florida who is from Istanbul. I was too old and my daughter too young but we really hit it off and he wants us to come visit. We e-mail a little. I think it’s just a matter of time before there is unity. I think people are figuring out that it’s all about love. And maybe I’m full of shit; just an old hippie who doesn’t know better because she doesn’t watch the news.
Comments (13)
“”"”"I think people are figuring out that it’s all about love. And maybe I’m full of shit; just an old hippie who doesn’t know better because she doesn’t watch the news.”"”"”" You are so not full of shit!
No wonder it is hard for you to write about a sex scene – it is about love!!! Listen to your heart on this dear one, please ignore an old guy’s idea about vividness. You know what you want to write, (it is about love,))) One of my favorite books is “Teach only Love.”" Gerald Jampolsky (another old hippy) Cheers
Breaks can be good as writing is like therapy, even those kind of sessions only happen perhaps twice a week, we need digestion time as people.
And you aren’t full of shit. Time will truly tell.
ryc: thank you:)
I agree on fiction. I tortured myself for years on fiction writing. And now, in my real-life, I do mostly essays and feature pieces, which I have come to feel are more fulfilling to me. Fiction leaves me with half-formed characters and hanging plot lines, and some nights, I worry that all my orphaned characters will sneak up on me in my dreams.
As to silence, I also agree. How else do you heal but by pouring out love–openly, verbally, physically…just contact?
Ah, but writing isn’t meant not to hurt sometimes, make us giddy other times, turn us on and off and everything in between. So keep writing…
I love the ending of this post… I’ve had a bad evening with family back home, and so find refuge here, in this beautiful vision, its clarity, and you’ve helped to re-balance me, thank you.
It is all about love; it most certainly is.
xo
This isn’t contingent on this post, I’ll contingent on that in moment, but have you ever read A Window Across the River by Brian Morton? Actually it is contigent if I think about it– the destructiveness in writing…
I don’t think fiction demands an overactive imagination, because to me all fiction on some level is biographical, auto or otherwise. So I won’t think it’s a waste– I know writers that think outside of imaginary boxes and writers that couldn’t fight their way out of a provided imaginary wet paper sack. I do agree that writing can be torture. It’s all about your threshold.
the whole silence thing bugged me too… i HATE meaningless actions
and it’s good to step back if you don’t lose your momentum!
I hope you’re right about the universe and love and wrong about writing fiction being a waste of time. Though believe me, I wonder that too, plenty, but compared with other hobbies, potentially obsessive as well, it’s not so bad. It does people good to have a project, I think, be it crocheting an afghan, learning the cello (or Spanish) or building model trains. If you count only the end product – well then we’re all fools, I guess.
Weekends are usually quiet on the net anyway which I’ve always thought strange. I guess most people use their time at work to Xanga, etc.? I barely have a moment all week long unless I get up very early.
One of the reasons I write poetry almost exclusively now is because it focuses my thoughts on particulars of an incident or a feeling. It’s a good way to get down to the essentials and get it entirely out. Sometimes I go back and expand on the poem until it becomes a longer story.
Hey! A moment of silence is always a good idea! In the case of a memorial for the London bombings,..it’s a wonderful idea!
Without really knowing the particulars, I can understand the reference to a day of silence in memory of the London bombing victims. I understand it, and I’ve said my prayers for those people and their families, and now I have to speak. In my humble opinion, there is altogether too much silence among us. The wrong kind of silence, of course – not the respectful kind, the pausing and reflecting, but the kind that lets horrible events and casualties and circumstances drift past the radar screen of public view, public recognition, public awareness. Our awareness. It’s not like we can do much about most of it, but at least we can be aware. Aware of the thousands of people dying across this planet at any given moment. Lots and lots of victims of terrorism out there. Every one of them deserves our attention. Also victims of poverty, and hunger, malnourishment and disease. I certainly do not have the power to reach out and save a single one of them, unless you count my annual donation to Heifer International, and the goat and chickens and vegetable seeds it bought for the family in Tanzania. A small offset for the 1st-world lifestyle of consumption that I lead, methinks.
Pru, your comment on my post was so appreciated. From one “old hippy” to another, blessings to you, sister, and you’re welcome to pop in anytime for tea and a slice of nectarine pie. Bring some friends, why don’t you, I’m hungry for this kind of company. Wish it were that easy, no? But I just wanted to point out that my little essay makes it sound like I eat home-cooked meals made from home-grown vegetables like, every day, and that just ain’t so. I have my share of convenience meals in the freezer, and potato chip bags in the cupboards, and my breakfasts at work are nothing more than a couple of cans of Slimfast. It’s a time and motivation thing, eating well, and goodness knows those are two precious commodities in our lives; we work at nurturing them to healthy levels but just as quickly Life seems to beat them back down. Still. Nice to know we’re heading in the right direction.
OBTW: I’m so jealous of your 5 acres. (I think I got that right?) You should share some pics sometime, make me even more jealous…hehehe! cheers – Kay
Hi there. I know what you mean about writing, sometimes with me it just flows & writes itself. Other times I need to work at it, maybe over work. Who knows.
Regarding your thoughts about global unity, I’m there with you in spirit but then I click on the TV or open a paper & 101 shootings, stabbings, etc. etc. & the breath is justtaken right out of me. My suggestion, don’t get another remote
Dear Prudence,
I see your comments on a lot of sites I read and I believe I may have even commented on earlier entries perhaps six or eight months ago when I first moved my blogs over to Xanga and consolidated them into WhenWordsCollide. I don’t believe you have ever visited my blog. I’m always searching for readers and new friends in Xangaland. I thought I’d comment on this entry, because of the interesting points you make.
I posted my “9/11 essay” on my blog this past Saturday, and was out most of the weekend, but wondered why there weren’t as many comments as I usually get, and then I noticed this “vow of silence” “in honor” of the London bombings. My first thought was that people were complaining that they couldn’t make comments a few weeks ago when Xanga had a glitch and comments couldn’t be made. My second thought coincides with yours. This is a time for more conversation and more dialogue (the conclusion to my own essay from 2001) if we are ever going to gain world wide understanding. You mention that the internet is global, which is a point I made as well.
Your statement that “wriitng is destructive” is an interesting one. If you are “protecting” the story, I would very much like to be added to the list to read it. However last time I mentioned this to a Xanga writer whose blog was “about” the book she was writing, it seemed that I couldn’t “read” the story because she only talked “about” it. And didn’t post any content. Needless to say, I didn’t find that a very interesting proposition.
Since this is the first visit (if in fact I have visited before, it was so long ago and I have forgotten, so I will act as if this is my first visit) I just read about a half a dozen recent posts, and can ascertain that you have only just begun this “book” and are posting the entires as protected because of content not suitable for those under 18.
Well, I don’t want to take up too much of your time. You mentioned “the narrator”. I only recently became aquainted with Ira and am attempting to read his online work. I am currently serializing both an “autobiographical novel’ I began writing at age 25 and a new series of essays entitled “My Sexual History”.
http://www.xanga.com/item.aspx?user=baldmike2004&tab=weblogs&uid=299279720
http://www.xanga.com/item.aspx?user=baldmike2004&tab=weblogs&uid=287266042
I’ve been asking my readers on a chapter by chapter basis if they think I should “protect” the sexual history series but nobody thinks it’s too “purient” as of yet.
Well, I look forward to returning and reading some more of your blog, and I invite you to check out WhenWordsCollide if time allows. I write “articles” and feature lots of graphics, so my posts tend to be long, and sometimes the blog has been known to crash browsers. I hope this is enough of a warning.
I totally agree with your assessment that what we need when it comes to world violence is more discussion, and less “silence”.
Michael F. Nyiri, poet, philosopher, fool
…yeah, mass communication between people in different countries probably can’t hurt…pretty spicy material you’ve been working on as of late…