On Qualities of Writing

I do still live. I just don't think I've had much to say, and I'm not going to post for the sake of posting. That writing usually emerges like stale coffee. No one wants that.*

Adjusting to a new city has been different than I expected. My problem today is having a limited number of people I know, much less to whom I can talk and not overwhelm. I would lay solid money on the proposition many of you (all three people who read this) have these days. The days where you have eighteen different trains of thought running at breakneck speed, and your mind is trying desperately to process them all, if for nothing else in the hopes of bringing some to conclusions so you'll sleep tonight. As I don't have anyone immediately available, I'm using this post to blow off some mental steam.

I'm nearing a point where I think I'll be able to write again. Fiction has been touch-and-go for me since freshman year of undergrad. It's no mystery why; my writing is still far too dependent upon how I view myself as a person. The connection is both frustrating and crucial. My writing changes as I change; nevertheless, I have to learn to uncouple my fiction and my self-perception to a greater extent, and learn to write outside myself. That is a difficult thing for me. I've become less mental (well, in some ways) and more okay with myself over the past couple of years in particular, but the moment I start thinking about my writing while I'm actually writing, the words scatter in the wind.

Madeleine L'Engle had this beautiful way of describing the creative process. As I don't have the particular quote on hand, I'm going to butcher it now in an attempt at summary. The essence of L'Engle's view is that creative process is a fine balance between gritty, dutiful work, application of time and effort, and letting the work be itself. This balance, I think, is exemplified in those times you're reviewing term papers, and come across a particularly beautiful or cogent phrase that you never recalled having written.**

I've stumbled across this balance a few times. Those are the moments I write half-consciously. The words happen; they knit themselves together into concepts and people and places. All I am, at that point, is a physical conduit to their concrete existence.

I have trouble letting the writing happen. That irks me. Because I know the qualities I wish my writing to possess. I want my words to be sharp and crisp and clean like the scent of pine on a winter night. I want characters to be multi-dimensional and plots to be stories both simple and layered at once.

It'll come, someday. The plugging-away-at-it in the meantime, however, is something at which I must continue.

(BTW, who's sad over the loss of Rory? Seriously. Hate you, Moffat, so much.)

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*Coffee grounds, on the other hand, are excellent compost material.

**Excessive amounts of caffeine and late hours spent in silent library cubicles can contribute to this sort of amnesia.