What if Writing Seems Too Hard?
The other day, when I was thinking about Harper Steele and wanting to write about my thoughts and feelings, I felt full and excited with the thrill of inspiration. The things I wanted to say were sparkling and glorious and meaningful and loving. The things I wanted to say made me feel happy to have this body and mind that could create such feelings visions. More than anything, I wanted to share what I carried inside with someone else, a reader, so I could feel…what? agency? power? love?
To have wonderful visions and to not share them can be like having an ice cream cone but no swallowing mechanism. You can taste how good it all is, but you can’t fully experience it.
When I sat down to write, I had the dreadful feeling that what I carried inside of me was actually a one-thousand pound boulder, and moving it from inside of me onto the paper felt like an impossible, stupid task. Not a task. A back-breaking, soul-crushing job.
Why bother? What’s the point in trying to get a wonderful feeling or vision on paper when chances are really good you are going to fail?
Here’s why: because what if you don’t fail? What if you make something even better? What if you make something completely unexpected? And what if you do fail? You get to be the person who said I tried instead of the person who said fuck it and ate a bowl of cereal instead.
And, because we are so freaking lucky, we can also be both: we can be the person who tried and the person who ate the bowl of cereal.
I wrote the piece about Harper and did not come close to creating the magnificence I felt inside, but it didn’t even bother me because I had run the race so to speak. I felt spent. I’d gone out and spent my energy and created what I created. I had tried.
Have fun pushing big stones out of your body. Can you not see why I’m so obsessed with pooping? Come on. Our bodies are writing our histories all the time, and we just flush them away like they were no big deal.
Amen. Etc.
art by Jonathan Parker
poops provided by dear friends
