Oct. 13: Hiding in plain sight
I'm a hard person to read.
Pretty much every girl I've ever dated has told me that. They never know how I'm feeling about anything, or even if I'm feeling anything at all. Wish I had a dime for everytime I was asked what I was thinking about or if I'm okay. Most of the time I am okay and when I'm thinking about something, it's not very earth-shattering. I'm probably counting the tiles on the bathroom ceiling or wondering if the water I am bathing in is filled with paramecia.
Come join me in my cell
Been told I'm like a moth, man. Won't fly too far from the flame or I'll freeze. Won't get too close or I'll burn. Gotta spend my life flapping my wings, getting tired...
Uh huh.
Last year I placed second in the World Brooding Championships. I was directly behind Al Pacino.
Pacino's latest movie - How to Put in Your Contacts
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Here is the first line from my favourite Leonard Cohen poem: "The reason I write is to make something as beautiful as you are."
I wish that could be true of me, but it's not. I find that the reason I write is to tell myself to stop being an asshole. When I write, I tend to channel this inner Shteevie - this angelic Shteevie - who knows that the world could be a happier place if we just changed our outlooks. As I look back at various writing projects - some aborted those others very much alive in my mind - I find some common themes. One of them is that I find complete strangers more interesting than the people I know very well. So many of my stories deal with existential hermits who are forced to build bonds with people they've never met before. I wonder if this is why I enjoy performing magic so much. I know that when I'm onstage, I'll be performing for a group of people who have never met me before. I'll likely never meet most of them again, which means that the only transaction we'll ever have in life is that I gave them (I hope) happiness.
-
But there is a dark side to everything, right?
Started writing a book once about a man who wakes up one morning to discover everyone in the world hates him. I mean everyone. It starts out being kind of goofy - poor guy gets assaulted by the elevator man and a janitor in his apartment building - but it gets very dark very fast. I have no idea what possessed me to write it (probably money or just to exorcise some really bad feelings) but the few who have read it declared it to be among the best writing I have ever done. "This needs to be published soon," one person said. "This book will definitely have a huge cult following."
But I can't bring myself to publish it. I'd feel damned.
And yet the funny thing, I'd much rather read a book like that than 50 Shades of Grey. Christians would be better off watching Se7en then Sex in the City or Pretty Woman.
-
When people tell me I'm a hard person to read, I take it as a compliment.
That puzzles me. When people tell you that they can't read you, aren't they telling you that you're a coward? Isn't the implication that "I don't know what you're thinking or feeling about something and I think I have a right to know this. You are not being forthcoming by concealing this information from me."
Maybe I'm just a proud denizen of Planet Man, where the natives believe that vulnerability is synonymous with weakness.
-
But I fight through my writing. I always have.
I used to say that Fahrenheit 451 was my favourite novel. I used to say that even though I'd never read it. The best thing about Fahrenheit 451 is Ray Bradbury's epilogue, where he attacks all the special interest groups and irate writers who want to tell him how to do his job. His anger is justified because what these people are doing is telling him that his worldview is unacceptable.
I quote the man:
"There is more than one way to burn a book. And the world is full of people running about with lit matches. Every minority, be it Baptist / Unitarian, Irish / Italian / Octogenarian / Zen Buddhist, Zionist/Seventh-day Adventist, Women's Lib/Republican, Mattachine/FourSquareGospel feel it has the will, the right, the duty to douse the kerosene, light the fuse. Every dimwit editor who sees himself as the source of all dreary blanc-mange plain porridge unleavened literature, licks his guillotine and eyes the neck of any author who dares to speak above a whisper or write above a nursery rhyme."
Should I ever get a book published and should I be lucky enough for it to garner some sort of mainstream attention, I imagine that I'll be inundated with angry letters. At the very least I'll find a myriad of bloggers (and blog repliers) willing to draw and quarter me for the crimes I've committed against secularism and literacy.
I am a writer and my worldview is Christian.
When I sit behind my typewriter, I think my sword is drawn.
When you see me on the street, the sword is in its scabbard. But trust me, my thoughts are always on when I may next remove it from its sheath.
Pretty much every girl I've ever dated has told me that. They never know how I'm feeling about anything, or even if I'm feeling anything at all. Wish I had a dime for everytime I was asked what I was thinking about or if I'm okay. Most of the time I am okay and when I'm thinking about something, it's not very earth-shattering. I'm probably counting the tiles on the bathroom ceiling or wondering if the water I am bathing in is filled with paramecia.
Come join me in my cellBeen told I'm like a moth, man. Won't fly too far from the flame or I'll freeze. Won't get too close or I'll burn. Gotta spend my life flapping my wings, getting tired...
Uh huh.
Last year I placed second in the World Brooding Championships. I was directly behind Al Pacino.
Pacino's latest movie - How to Put in Your Contacts-
Here is the first line from my favourite Leonard Cohen poem: "The reason I write is to make something as beautiful as you are."
I wish that could be true of me, but it's not. I find that the reason I write is to tell myself to stop being an asshole. When I write, I tend to channel this inner Shteevie - this angelic Shteevie - who knows that the world could be a happier place if we just changed our outlooks. As I look back at various writing projects - some aborted those others very much alive in my mind - I find some common themes. One of them is that I find complete strangers more interesting than the people I know very well. So many of my stories deal with existential hermits who are forced to build bonds with people they've never met before. I wonder if this is why I enjoy performing magic so much. I know that when I'm onstage, I'll be performing for a group of people who have never met me before. I'll likely never meet most of them again, which means that the only transaction we'll ever have in life is that I gave them (I hope) happiness.
-
But there is a dark side to everything, right?
Started writing a book once about a man who wakes up one morning to discover everyone in the world hates him. I mean everyone. It starts out being kind of goofy - poor guy gets assaulted by the elevator man and a janitor in his apartment building - but it gets very dark very fast. I have no idea what possessed me to write it (probably money or just to exorcise some really bad feelings) but the few who have read it declared it to be among the best writing I have ever done. "This needs to be published soon," one person said. "This book will definitely have a huge cult following."
But I can't bring myself to publish it. I'd feel damned.
And yet the funny thing, I'd much rather read a book like that than 50 Shades of Grey. Christians would be better off watching Se7en then Sex in the City or Pretty Woman.
-
When people tell me I'm a hard person to read, I take it as a compliment.
That puzzles me. When people tell you that they can't read you, aren't they telling you that you're a coward? Isn't the implication that "I don't know what you're thinking or feeling about something and I think I have a right to know this. You are not being forthcoming by concealing this information from me."
Maybe I'm just a proud denizen of Planet Man, where the natives believe that vulnerability is synonymous with weakness.
-
But I fight through my writing. I always have.
I used to say that Fahrenheit 451 was my favourite novel. I used to say that even though I'd never read it. The best thing about Fahrenheit 451 is Ray Bradbury's epilogue, where he attacks all the special interest groups and irate writers who want to tell him how to do his job. His anger is justified because what these people are doing is telling him that his worldview is unacceptable.
I quote the man:
"There is more than one way to burn a book. And the world is full of people running about with lit matches. Every minority, be it Baptist / Unitarian, Irish / Italian / Octogenarian / Zen Buddhist, Zionist/Seventh-day Adventist, Women's Lib/Republican, Mattachine/FourSquareGospel feel it has the will, the right, the duty to douse the kerosene, light the fuse. Every dimwit editor who sees himself as the source of all dreary blanc-mange plain porridge unleavened literature, licks his guillotine and eyes the neck of any author who dares to speak above a whisper or write above a nursery rhyme."
Should I ever get a book published and should I be lucky enough for it to garner some sort of mainstream attention, I imagine that I'll be inundated with angry letters. At the very least I'll find a myriad of bloggers (and blog repliers) willing to draw and quarter me for the crimes I've committed against secularism and literacy.
I am a writer and my worldview is Christian.
When I sit behind my typewriter, I think my sword is drawn.
When you see me on the street, the sword is in its scabbard. But trust me, my thoughts are always on when I may next remove it from its sheath.
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