11/23/2020

it has been a while since i last wrote here... well, actually, i did write about that silly dream a couple of days ago... but anyway.

i think i kind of got stuck this weekend, at least in terms of my routines. in part it was because i had a stupid headache on saturday. but it was also because i was trying to work on my writing assignment for the writer's workshop that i'm participating in. i basically decided to use the assignment to break the inertia that i'd had with some of my writing projects, notably this "kappa noodle" story that's been haunting my head for so long. at first, i thought i did a decent job of it, and it felt pretty easy, pretty flow-y, writing it. but having heard it read, in retrospect, i realize how long-winded it sounded. a particular error on my part was having a character retell another story. there is nothing more boring than having characters TELL stories. but i guess, i guess a lot of what i like to write tends to be like that. explanations. i wish it were otherwise, but i guess that's me.

so, right now, i'm feeing kind of down on my writing, and my "writing style." it's something that i think people patiently endure when they read it, but it definitely isn't something to celebrate...

at the same time, i feel two influences: 1) this optimistic faith in the "flow," largely due to my participation in this writer's workshop; and 2) this drive to finish the damn thing. so i'm hoping that, through those two influences, i am able to "rid [this story] from my bones." (from the decemberists "engine driver"). hopefully, they will carry me through...

***

i put off so much nowadays. i am only a skeleton held together by a frame of obligations.

***

i think my wife works miracles. i feel that she is so full of love, that she breathed me into being, and made me into something half-worth this life. me, on the other hand, with this perpetual chip on my shoulder, and leaky chamber in my heart, i have this cruelty imprinted upon me, perhaps by others, but which i perpetuate endlessly. i try to hide it, most of the time successfully, by a feigned kindness, a sense of obligation... but i lack the true breathing love that my wife embodies. i am so blessed to have her, to have been loved by her. otherwise, i would still have been haunted by my own self-hate, pursued by it as i have been relentlessly for decades of my life...

***

i don't really know what else to write about at the moment... i'm just pushing forward, like everyone else.