In her book, Bird by Bird : Some Instructions on Writing and Life, Anne Lamott tells us to sit our asses down and write consistently, at the same time every day, for at least a little while. I am a college student. By default, my appointed hour seems to be around 11 pm, after all my homework is done, and before all the dinner dishes are washed. (It’s my dish night.)
I was slightly afraid of declaring that I was going to write every day for a month. It feels too much like I’m going to jinx it. I guess I forget that I don’t have to write one thousand word wonders every day. I just have to write. It’ll probably be a lot of shitty first drafts. A lot of word vomit. But maybe four days out of the thirty, I’m going to write something brilliant. Or even just good. Or I’m going to write a sentence I really like, that I’m going to think about before I go to bed at night, that I’m going to dream about, and that I’m going to come back to in the morning. Or I’m going to meet someone who will tell me an interesting story, or I may beg, borrow, and steal stories from the lives of my friends and professors and acquaintances.
I will try not to get cynical and bitter about the winter weather as November wears in.
I will also try not to get cynical and bitter about the topic of love, which, apparently, I’m becoming, if anyone takes a look at the monologue I just wrote for Acting I, or actually, hey, a lot of the pieces I’ve written lately. One of my friends was notoriously relationship-shy, and she just accepted the fact that she’s in relationship, and she gave me The Look, a couple of days ago.
“You know,” she said, sort of ominously, “the minute you accept that you’re going to be perfectly okay by yourself for the rest of your life, is when he’s going to show up.”
I chased her out the door and shut it firmly behind her.
Which I think says quite a bit, right there. I like ideals. I like the idea of being in love. I like ideas much more than real people, I think.
So that rant, I suppose, was something that has been bothering me for a couple of days. That sneaking suspicion, as bright-eyed as the mice that run around my kitchen at night, that I don’t quite want to admit to myself. And that’s part of sitting my ass down and writing.
Admitting things to yourself.
Getting it out.
Transforming negativity into art.
The paper and pen are the two greatest confessors I’ve ever known.
The Wanderer 