Back in January, I decided to avoid non-fiction writing in order to focus on reading more and dedicating time to my fiction writing, instead. I deliberately gave up writing an essay a day, a decision I'd hoped would give me all sorts of positive effects.
That has not been the case. It is the end of September (tomorrow, at any rate), and with three months left in the year I am standing at about 360,000 words (not counting this month). In 2018, I had surpassed that total by the end of June. In fact, my annual total for last year landed at over 625,000 words--more than half a million of these little squiggles--and that included both a NaNoWriMo novel and a completed summer novel project. At this particular juncture, though I've written three of my five planned novellas, I do not have nearly as much to show for my effort as I did previously. I mean, at the rate I'm going, I will have written more words by September 2018 than I did in all of 2019. I don't know why this surprises me. I knew that I'd have fewer words written than I had historically done. It isn't actually a shock to see this happen…except it is. I guess I thought that there'd be some sort of magical output in my fiction writing because I wasn't refining my mental vomit--I mean, non-fiction essays--as much anymore. But the end result was just more video games. I read less (though I'm pushing through Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince now, having started in July my reread of that series, so at least there's progress there) than I had anticipated, even though the other aspects of my life are running more smoothly than ever before. We've lived at New Place for over three years now, so my timing, commutes, extracurricular activities, and other aspects of life are kind of getting done the way they're supposed to be getting done. I'm teaching with minimal preparation, as almost everything is a repeat of previous years and/or my own passions. Even with Puck being in middle school, I still don't have that many changes to my life. And maybe that's why I was expecting more of myself. I hoped that the stability of my life would lead to greater output. Since that hasn't happened, it's been harder on me than I care to admit. In fact, I've seriously considered giving up on writing. I'd still write in my reading journal, as it's one of the few places that feels like a worthwhile place to put my effort. But I've considered just giving up--deleting my query spreadsheet (having received two rejections in the past month), "boxing up" my digital manuscripts, and not even worrying about anything I've written ever again. Of course, those days were also dark days for my depression, so I didn't really trust any decision I would come to. Part of the reason I continue to want to write is I'm worried about changing fundamental parts of who I see myself as. I've always seen myself as a writer, and I realize that 36 years isn't really so old that I should give up on what is, historically, an old person's game. But that hasn't changed my feelings of wanting to be part of a profession at the exact time that profession has started its decline into obsolescence. I'm just old enough to have my dream-claws latched into the way bookselling used to be, and just young enough to see that the old way is continually dying. But I'm not young enough to feel confident in the alternative types of writing in the twenty-first century. Wattpad frightens me. Kickstarter is anti-union for its workers and, besides, what do I know of self-publishing anyway? And, yeah, self-publishing is going a long way from its roots of error-riddled schlock, but you still don't get a lot of exposure or value in self-publishing, do you? (This isn't to say that self-publishing isn't a good move for some people; in my case, it feels as much like a failure as walking away from the keyboard entirely. It's simply not something that I want…and if I change my mind, I don't know how I'm going to feel about myself. Is it capitulation? Or finally finding my voice?) I think I see things this way, in part, because I've had so many things go right in my life--the only woman I ever dated in my life became my wife; I went to exactly one elementary school, one middle school, one high school, one college, and I've taught at only one charter school as the entirety of my twelve year teaching career; I got my degree without failing a class or being unable to get into the education system. Essentially, I bear a charmed life (even taking into account the immense difficulty I personally had while caring for a heart baby some twelve years ago). And, with the exception of my family situation, I have only had one over-riding goal for myself in my life, one thing that I had always assumed would happen with the same sort of thoughtless faith as reliance on gravity: I would be a writer. I pinned my sense of identity and self to that (among other things, which I won't worry about putting down here), and the fact that I'm still not a writer is leading to a bit of an ontological crisis. What am I if I'm not a Writer with a capital W? An imposter, maybe? An aspirant? A pretender? What's most frustrating about this, is I'm aware of how wrong it is for me to think this way. The external validation of having a book, of seeing it sit on the shelf at the book store, of being able to watch a stream of would-be customers avoiding eye contact with me at a book signing…I've always pinned my hopes of feeling like a writer on that experience. I've been dreaming about it since I was single-digits old. And anyone who's been working on a dream for almost three decades and isn't much closer to fulfilling that dream than when he started isn't likely to feel like there's a lot of value in continuing the fight. I realize that this has been quite the pity-party post. I'm not apologizing for that, as I feel justified in expressing my feelings on my own website. However, I'm not writing all of this as a bid for assurances from others about my goals and dreams--I'm explaining, more to myself than anyone else, some of the thoughts that have been hurting me lately. It's the kind of cheap therapy that even a teacher can afford. |
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