The Art of War

Alright, I haven't updated this business since I was in Europe, which last I checked was over 2 months ago. I'm bordering on a large amount of frustration with my novel, and I think the main problem is Colorado Springs. I mean, perhaps it is my mindstate, and I shouldn't be blaming something as mindless and unlikely as an entire city. Still, though, I feel like there is some merit to the claim when analyzed in the proper light.

Moreso than anything else, it is MY particular experience of this city. I have a few scattered friends left here, but the majority of them are either running in ruts that they have dug for themselves, or trapped in downward-spiraling relationships which rust over most of the basic enjoyments of life for them. This is a frustrating position for me to be in, because I feel like I don't have a correct or healthy social outlet to really satiate my appetites for interaction. In Portland and especially in Europe, I had droves of people to express myself to and explore with. Here, I barely have a reason to leave the house. You would think, at first glance, that this would be good for a writing project...giving me plenty of time to buckle down and get invigorated about the world that I am creating in my head. Unfortunately, for whatever reason, this is not working well for me. When I get up in the morning, I often look at my computer and feel a shiver of revulsion towards it. I occupy myself in other ways, with books or movies or something of the sort. Then I start to feel guilty because I know I have so much progress that I need to be spindling off my fingertips, and it is not happening.

Sometimes I do find bursts of inspiration....I usually try to write at least once or twice a day. Most of these efforts end in frustration (and moreso, distraction, I think because I feel socially unfulfilled for the time being), but some of them do result in writing and story progress which I am proud of. I'm at least making progress, even if not at the clip that I would hope for. The mainline of this post, however, is a concern about writing in general, because I feel that my hesitance and dodging of it is beginning to color the activity, the experience of actually writing, in a dismal grey. Whereas before....perhaps before, it was a vibrant green, or a cerulean blue~

Karl at Trident (where I currently am, coincidentally) once told me that the most important time to write, to his mind, was when you were most frustrated with your writing process and lack of inspiration. It rung somewhat true to me at the time, but I'm beginning now to realize how many pages of experience that sentence probably resonated with in his mind. I was amateur (at best) then; hell, I would be hard-pressed to call myself anything but amateur still. This guy was probably in his mid-fifties, though, so to him it must be (even though I didn't know it at the time he spoke it) an overarching axiom which governed his life, his entire creative process. Now that I can apply my more seasoned perspective to this one-upon-a-statement of his, it begins to snowball with meaning. I can only imagine that it will continue to do so for the rest of my life, or writing career....whichever turns out to be shorter.

I know deep down that if I continue to press on in my efforts to write (I am talking now about a singular instance, one moment where I apply my fingers to the keyboard and try to push one of them a millimeter down, enough to make a single character register - but knowing that to do this is a first brushstroke, and it will necessarily govern every one which follows it), I will eventually break through to expressing something potent, something which I feel is meaningful to me personally, to the point where sentences will begin to tumble through my mind faster than my hands can record them. That's the goal; also the rub. Many times that I end up sitting with my hands resting gingerly on the keys, I cannot make that first millimeter-drop. I get anxious. And when that happens, your body expresses itself as it usually does in situations of anxiety: activating your fight-or-flight response; stealing electricity from your imagination and surging instead straight to the amygdala. Then I just close the screen....then I just turn on an episode of Seinfeld.

I feel like if I had more satiation, my creativity would flow much more freely. My mind would latch easier onto concepts, and develop them in intriguing ways. This city in Winter, however, leaves me feeling stagnant on many fronts. It drones and buzzes and dulls the blade of my mind, and I think this is fatiguing me....physically, from just sitting much of the time and perhaps not getting enough exercise (a writer's curse as well), but also mentally, crushing my creativity by not supplying an outlet for interaction with nature, for witticisms traded amongst friends, for philosophy which juices the mind for all its contents.

I'll do my best with the situation as I can until I get back to Portland. Only a month more~ The goal is a first draft by the time I arrive. We'll find out if that's a reasonable expectation.