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I have been writing these writes daily, trying to get something out here, but with a lot of these, I am not content, because some nights I didn't want to say anything and yet I wrote something because I thought I had to. And it wasn't work that surprised me or revealed in me an inner admiration, which is what I now figure I want.
So I will discontinue this.
I listened to John Cleese's talk on creativity and it became apparent to me that I need give space to writing, actually set out time for it to come, time where nothing is wrong and I am just at play. That is in contrast with what I have been doing for most of these writes: writing hurriedly in some umbric corner of the day about another corner of that day. Talking about cobwebs.
I'd rather not publish anything, because I pressure myself into a finished state, even though these writes have mostly just been gatherings from the top of the cliff, thrown off into the beyond of the internet. It would be more fruitful to set aside time - not to get something to a published state from the first go, but to just write; be still first, then write out of that stillness. Give time to it.
No promises on what will come, if anything. I feel that I need to show up to it. Show up, with the time, at the time, and be. Maybe writing will happen.
At the traffic lights which had turned red just as I drove up to them, I finger-fanned myself then leaned across the passenger seat to grab the grey handle and wind down the window. This was the first time that I had ever been able to do that.
There's a sense of independence, yeah. I could feel its revolution with the responsibility of driving by myself.
It's cool.
I cannot think of how else to describe it, because I don't feel it needs a word that's closer, more precise and less generic in meaning. If I'm to write the truth, this case of blurry is accurate enough.
Independence: following an unruled straight line through its curves.
It's somewhat refreshing to watch a story like Mad Men without advertisements. Ironically, the show itself features an advertising agency, but I don't feel like I'm being sold something. That's either cleverly subtle, then, or innocent. I doubt it's both.
I had the quick thought though: what if reading a story had advertisements, and in between each chapter there was a pause which would interrupt you. I'm glad it isn't like that.
Buy this. Think of this. Place your attention here.
Ads could park themselves neatly on the white lines between paragraphs. There is something to be said about there being spaces for ads; if a paragraph hooks towards the end, and there is then a pause, digestion and wonderment occurs and potentially one anticipates what will happen next, and waits for it through the pause. The pause itself though, when filled with ads, attracts attention in itself, so there is perhaps less time for digestion and quiet contemplation amidst the story, but instead an interruption.
I'd imagine there is place for space in the middle of stories, and I could imagine it being just white space. Seems peaceful.
I miss you.
I don't miss you.
Automatic reciprocity has been conditioned as a default, but honesty doesn't accept this. I am learning then to more align what I say with what I act, even if I use markers of concession often.
I think there's a pressure not wholly self-generated to miss the person who misses me. Unrequited missing has happened to me before, and I recognised through that that the pressure falsely represents reality. Some people just don't miss others who miss them.
In
Mad Men, Faye Miller says to Don early in season four: "In a nutshell,
it all comes down to what I want versus what’s expected of me."
My ego mind has a problem with being missed. But I understand further than it.
I passed. I turned off the engine, pressed down the clutch and put the car in first gear, I pulled the handbrake and looked at the car's front in the window ahead, wondering whether I had parked within the lines. The instructor said she had a few improvements I should make. Rear view mirror use. Reverse parallel parking. Smoother gear changes. But I passed. When mum opened the front passenger door, I glimpsed the white line parallel enough to the car.
I drove home partly relieved, partly unsure. I hardly slept last night, so I'm thankful for this success.
My friend told me that once I get my restricted license, I'll feel freedom, because I'll be more independent. Although I've yet to drive by myself, I don't yet feel that freedom. I may yet, but somehow I doubt it.
Freedom is different to someone who isn't restricted, and I haven't felt so: in terms of driving, my parents and brother have nearly always been willing to provide me with transport to wherever I wanted to go, and in the other cases, my friends were willing to oblige. I've never been troubled for finding my way. So although I can now drive by myself legally, I don't think it'll be much of a change. But I may have it wrong.
Today my girlfriend was over at my house. We watched a movie, laughed about it, ate lunch, then talked and played some brain games on the bed. After those, I felt unstimulated, and she asked me if I was bored. I said no, but I probably was bored on the level of me that wanted and liked interaction. Nine or so months ago, if she would have come to my place, we would have talked awhile about each other, getting to know who the other person is, recounting events, but also exchanging analyses of problems and being vulnerable.
My boredom, tentatively referred to as such, didn't have feathers enough to wing me away from wanting to be with her, thought it was pulling at me like a loose yarn at the end of a shirt, begging to be cut. She said, amidst the space, that there isn't anything to talk about, because we have less problems.
That pathed in two ways. One, it made me think how problem-driven conversations have been between us. I made the commitment to not have fix-it corneas when talking to her, so recently when she's presented something, I listened then gave my opinion, instead of analysing the situation and figuring out the solution for her, something she has proven herself much more capable of doing if she has a sounding board, not a problem-solver. So without problems to solve, our talk today was lighter. Was it boring? On some level, the aforementioned petty I-want-stimulation-and-entertainment level, it was, because it wasn't engaging my mind's problem solving abilities. It wasn't challenging. However, by giving that part of myself space, I was able, without realising it at the time, to not interfere too much with what was happening. After becoming aware of the lack of 'stuff' floating in the air and the speedbump of the ego wanting to be useful, the last hour or so we spent together was calmer. My mind was somewhat entertained by some more thinking games, and they helped get it through to some periods (read: full stops).
Two, I thought about what if in the future we are together and we have even less problems than we do now. The ego wouldn't like that. I think though, that with time (read: space), its influence would diminish, and we can simply be together. Happiness is absorption, I learned last year. Today tells me happiness is also stillness, whether fullness or emptiness.
The first thing, before these words, are the words above. Like light shining down through waves of clouds onto the matter of the earth and its below. I quite like how Mad Men episodes seem to be titled: a morsel of something that happens within that episode, or something umbrellic to wrap around key events. I'm oversimplifying it - each episode is called so for a different reason, and I can only speculate as to why.
There's one episode, "Wee Small Hours" of season three, in which those three words are never said, but the featured dramatic events occur during the early morning. There's another episode, from season two, called "The Mountain King" which features only briefly, for less than a minute, a boy playing "In the Hall of the Mountain King" on piano when Don enters the scene. There is probably significance in terms of suggesting that Don is the mountain king, and other connections I haven't thought of, but what I find intriguing is the possibility of calling a write by one moment, one inch of a thing happening that is important, or somehow insignificant on the initial apparence, but made important, or made to wonder at its importance, by its inclusion in the title.
It doesn't have to umbrella. It can just be quietly significant.
I kept to the idea that the title has to encompass the whole write, but I find the idea of titling a write with but a nail of what is in it, or a shadow of a nail that may not even be written about but cast anyway, if reading alertly, romantically appealing.
That chosen thing ought to have some concrete weight, or some metaphysical grounding. It's gotta have written blood running through it, so it can head the write and the write can live.
