Sunday, March 03, 2024

Types on the phone and in one's feelings. a dangerous combination

While I often send someone an errant text or meme saying "This made me think of you!" it's something I've rarely experienced. 

When I'm deep in self pity it must be because why would anyone care to send something. Right? 

When I'm a bit grounded it's beacuse they are busy or, let's be sincerely practical and honest, have actual engaged conversations with others. We just went to high school together or worked together five years ago. Didn't go to war together or something like that.

It could also just be life and people ilare too paralyzed by being there for everyone but themselves. Why bother engaging? Sometimes at work I'll responded with a quip or meme in Teams chat and get no responses. No heart of LOL emojis. Why bother engaging? They know I saw it and likewise they also took a glance.

Writing fiction is exhausting. Even crummy ones like what has been on the blog. I can't help but feel like a memory thief putting situations on the page that I want to make my own but are just clippings of lived experiences. Other people's experiences. My greatest fear is not that someone will read it and say this sucks. Instead that they will read it and say "Oh this is like when we went on thay trip to Alaska" or "Is this character supposed to be so and so?"

In college I would do short story readings in public. Horrible open mic nights on random Wednesdays or sad brown Friday nights. I could read to groups of strangers but never a friend, significant other or family.  They would know and surgically extract. "You are less like an onion and more of an orange," said a coworker to me once as we discussed annual reviews. "It's a hard exterior but just being real sweet and honest inside. It's a good thing, really. I think you care more than what you want people to think." 

I'm writing this as an excuse to not finish my story. I want to sound wise but feels like there is not much more to say. I've peaked. I want to say it was 2009 and 2013 and 2018 that were the highlights. A roller coaster now building energy to help someone else go.

No comments:

Long Night of Solace

I think I'm going to put the blog formally on hiatus. I've reached a comfortable nadir in my life, edging between depression and spu...