So it’s down to the wire and the only topic so far is no blog topic at all and The Wife’s cat is licking peanut butter off my spoon as I type. Now there’s a lead-in. Query to self – does Seinfeld have days like this?
This is the second day with no official writing projects and it’s hell. Cranking out 4-5 pages a session for the last 2 years provided a lot of focus to my writing. Vacations are fine and all, but I need to write. This is the biggest conflict and the one I wrestle with the most frequently at times I don’t like to write, yet I must. Let me repeat that since it sounds important � at times I don’t like to write, yet I must.
I’m suspicious of people who say they love writing. I love words. I love reading. I love reading other people’s words, but to love my own words strikes me as a crippling sort of vanity. Instead, every so often I write something that I like. Sort of.
Writing resembles raising a child in the same way that there is no controlling a child. Children behave based on the examples their parental figures provide. Hopefully every role model sets a good example, but if a kid wants to stick their finger in the electric socket or throw a ball in the house, the kid will win that argument. To write may appear easier than reigning in a child, because it seems that the author has control over the finished product, the control that a parent lacks. After all, writers focus x hours per day, 5 or more days a week for the purpose of perfecting a manuscript. Children don’t come with copy paste and multiple undos, do they?
But the control the writer brandishes is an illusion. I have no control over what comes out when I write, revise and revise again. The only control is the choice to sit down and take the chance on the process or not. And it’s a process that never ends.
Checking my watch, I see I have 5 minutes left on my blog a day deadline 😉