3CB

Disclaimer: This is me thinking out loud, and may serve no purpose other than to clear my head. #KthxBye.

These thoughts have been going on for two weeks. I’m sitting at my desk, with lots of not-so-random thoughts drifting by. I was once asked what a writer is. I said you’re a writer as long as you write. Which makes me sad because I see myself as a writer before all else, and I haven’t written in months. Does that mean I’ve lost myself somehow?

In some ways, it feels like I have. I’ve sunk into the drudgery of everyday life. Wake up. Prepare the baby for school. Go to the office. Come back home. Check homework. Prepare the baby for bed. Sleep. Repeat. It’s like there’s no soul in my life anymore, like I’m drowning in the mundane.

I’ve often said I envy people who don’t think. Because what I’ve just described is everybody’s life. The difference is … not everybody considers it a national disaster. To most people, this is just life. But to the overthinkers among us, the ordinariness of existence is something to … well … THINK about. Because for us, life should be anything but ordinary. It should be full and vibrant and meaningful. It should have a purpose that is higher, broader, and deeper than commutes and sex and chores.

I’m thinking about this now because in the past few months, I’ve thrown myself into a project that brought me large amounts of joy, pain, stress, pleasure, and music. I thought it was my way out, my ticket beyond the ordinary life I had slipped into. Now that project is gone, largely because of my *principles* and I’m feeling rather lost.

I’m wondering what the point of these morals is, if they only stop me from doing something profitable. I’m wondering what the past four months were about, and what it was all for. Was it just another round of random ordinariness? And yet, without these morals that are peeving me so badly, I wouldn’t be me, and I wouldn’t have the skills and constitution to do what I did.

That’s what makes it almost a conundrum. I joined the project for the same reason I left it. Vicious circle I suppose. It’s a bit like struggling to get to the top of a mountain, then beating yourself up for having the determination to get there, because now you have to go back down and the whole trip seems pointless.

For most people, this question wouldn’t even come up, because the point of climbing a mountain is to climb a mountain, right? Or to say that you have. At the very least, you climb to enjoy the view. It reminds me of the video for ♫ Free ♫ by Rudimental. In the video, this guys spends several gruelling weeks struggling to the summit of a mountain. Then he straps on a para-wing-gliding thingie and flies down in less than an hour.

Watching that video, I first ask myself what he was smoking, and what would possess me to jump off such a mountain for kicks. Then I ask if he thought it was worth weeks of torture just for one hour of pleasure. The look on his face says it was, at least for him.

There doesn’t need to be some deep philosophcal reason for doing such crazy things, at least not for the average person. He did it because he wanted to do it, and because he could. With my project, I worked on it because I wanted it to succeed. And it did. Now it’s over and everything is crumbling. Trust, belief, friendships … and all because of money.

So I’m asking myself what the point was, why I even bothered. Logically speaking, the project succeeded, so the aftermath shouldn’t matter. The goal was achieved. I suppose the reason I’m upset is we had different ideas of success, different measures of how it should all end. So while some people are perfectly content with the result, I’m disillusioned and really, really sad.

There IS a logical side to my mind. And it’s telling me to stop being overly emotional, to look at things rationally, to stop blowing the situation out of proportion. It’s telling me I expect too much from people, and that I always think the worst of them … descriptors that seems oddly contradictory. Another part of me says the reason I am who I am is that I see people better than they see themselves, which makes me think the best and worst of them often at the exact same time.

Sometimes I think I need to get out of the real world, stop interacting with flesh and blood, and just write stories in my head. Or better yet, write these stories on paper and get paid for them. After all, my characters will never disappoint me. They will always live exactly how I want them to live. Plus, I get to play God, which is always fun. Now there’s an idea.

♫ You found me ♫ The Fray ♫

That’s not an entirely accurate statement. Aside from the occasional Stargate or Greys’ Anatomy marathon, I rarely watch TV. Not even for the movies. I do enjoy series though. I torrent a season at a time and get completely lost in the story. But then again, everybody watches series in chunks these days. There are down sides, of course. Like, if I watch 13 episodes at a time, I can see the exact spot where the writer ran out of ideas. And I get tired of re-used tropes far more quickly.

For example, I adored Big Bang Theory for a while, and the first time Sheldon said, ‘My mother had me tested,’ I nearly split my sides laughing. But after watching 15 episodes in a row and hearing the phrase fifty times, it gets a little boring. The up side is it beats waiting a whole week for my next fix of Penny. Still, lately, I’m not so sure serials worth it. And it’s all because of one simple word. Rape.

Disclaimer: this could be a trauma trigger, so please read with care.

For most women, rape is the worst thing that could happen. Fear of rape affects where we go, who we talk to, how we dress, and what time we go home. Once it has happened, well, there’s always the fear that it could happen again. In any given situation – a fire, a war, a robbery, a quiet street, a crowded matatu, a riot, a one-on-one job interview … the fear is always there.

I suppose that’s why I like series. They run for an hour at a time, and in that space, I can forget the stresses, and yes, the fears of ordinary life. Here’s the thing though. I found a recent quote that said art must reflect society. And so even in fiction, there is lots of rape.

I’ve learned to consciously avoid what I call ‘depressing’ points of fiction. I won’t watch anything with gender violence, racism, slavery, abduction, child abuse, or feminism as a theme. So I’m one of the few that hasn’t looked for 12 years a slave. I prefer to stay with smart comedy and safe, fluffy fiction. Big Bang Theory. Last of the summer wine. Eureka. Charmed.

So I was pretty happy when I found Downton Abbey. It has everything! Beautiful clothes. Genius lines. And best of all, lot and lots of British accents. *happy sigh* Until Anna.

I understand that fiction must portray reality. I get that art reflects life. What I don’t get is why we feel the need to use rape quite so callously. It’s like a writer sits back and thinks hey, nothing has happened in the story for a while. Let’s just throw in a random rape to move the plot along.

I don’t understand why a man would feel the need to rape a woman. In theory, I understand the power, the need for control. But why not kick a dog, or shoot a plate. Why force yourself on a woman just because you’re – what – cold, lonely, angry, horny? And when a writer decides to do that to some random character, then really, why?

I understand – on a logical level – that rape evokes such raw reactions that you can’t NOT use it in drama. But in a strory that already had everything – including a rabid following – it was rather needless to throw that in. I feel ambushed. I feel rather like I was attacked myself. Granted, as one who has experienced rape, I feel that way every time I see it in fiction. But this one hurt me more specifically, because it was so callous, so uncalled for, so out of character for the show.

It felt exactly like walking down a safe, harmless street and being jumped by a rapist. It hurt so much specifically because I never saw it coming. And in that way, it was a very realistic portrayal of the act, because no victim ever sees it coming.

That’s part of why it hurts so much. You’re happily walking down a street, or you’re at a job interview, or you’re spending time with a man you trust. Suddenly everything changes. You’re not a human being anymore. You’re an object that somebody wants, and they viciously take what they want, simply because they can.

I’m generally fussy about what I watch. Now I feel nothing is really safe, not even trite, fluffy period dramas loaded with wit and British accents. I doubt I’ll be watching Season 5 of Downton Abbey. Or Scandal. Or Broke Girls. Or anything really. In fact, I’ll probably stick to really old books and documentaries.

And reality shows on cookery and fashion. Because at least rape hasn’t snuck into that market yet. And on that note, I’m off the find the Great Gatsby. On PDF. But maybe I should Google it first, just to be sure there’s nothing in there that I don’t want to read.

♫ Everything ♫ Alanis Morissette ♫

A lot of people call me kind, gentle, outgoing, generous. But like almost everyone on the planet, I don’t see myself the way the world does. In my own mind, I’m petty, isolated, introverted, selfish. And I see this most clearly in my writing. See, the average writer writes for his audience. He puts words on paper that his readers want to buy. Me, I mostly write for myself. My words are my one indulgence. Well, my one public indulgence.

It’s odd, because I see myself as a writer above all else. Except, of course, my daughter. She is my whole world, and so I suppose being a mother trumps being a writer. That said, I often describe myself as a writer first, then a mother. Maybe it’s because my identity is more closely linked to books than to childbirth. Or maybe it’s because my subconscious knows I was writer long before I learned how to use my … ovaries.

Whenever someone asks me what a writer is, I say it’s a person that writes. And since I haven’t properly written in ages, I could argue that I’m not a writer anymore. I feel that way when I look at my work. It lacks the passion it once had, the effortless elegance, the ease and reflex, the intrinsic skill. When I look at my words now, they seem so much less … me. In some ways, I seem so much less me.

My work life has been pretty hectic lately. I don’t just mean on a task-based level. I mean I’m at a point where I’m drudging along. Where I walk out of the house, lock the door, and stand there for five minutes asking why exactly I’m going to the office. And after a spirited debate, I realise the only reason is that I can’t say why not. I can’t go back inside and tell my daughter that sometimes, when you don’t feel like going to work, you don’t have to. Because what would stop her from applying the same logic to school? And so I go to work.

I’ve asked myself if I dislike my job, and the answer is … not partuclarly. My workmates are cool, my boss is easy-going, my dress code is heavenly, I can wear my headphones all day, the pay is great, I have space and time to read … there’s not a lot more I could ask for in a job.

So why am I unhappy, and what would I rather be doing? The answer is always the same. Just like a billion people on this planet, I’d like to be a novelist. I’d like to write long, page-turning stories that move people’s lives and make me lots of money. I’m not sure I want my books turned into movies. I’m too much of a control freak for that. I’d just like people to read my work, love it, remember it. I’d like my words to mean something. And I’d like those words to turn into a penthouse with a heated swimming pool.

Every time I have this conversation objectively – even if it’s just inside my head – I realise there’s nothing stopping me from writing those stories. I suppose I’m afraid nobody will want to publish my novels, or that once they have, nobody will want to buy them. I’m thinking of the thousands of books in thousands of libraries that nobody will take off the shelf. The millions of e-books on Amazon that no-one has even heard of. Maybe I’m afraid of being another drop in the ocean of unread books. Or maybe I just need an excuse not to start.

When I first blogged in 2007, I wasn’t concerned about who would read me, or whether they would read me at all. Wait. That’s not entirely true, seeing as I emailed the link to everyone in my phone book. But mostly, I just wanted to write. I had a lot to say, and seeing it on (electronic) paper made me happy.

That feeling doesn’t last very long. A blogger might pretend that they don’t care about hits or awards or popularity, but deep down, everyone that writes, or sings, or performs, or says a single word out loud does it because they want to be seen, heard, appreciated.

So I suppose what I miss is the feeling of writing regardless. The bliss of putting down words even if I know that no one will see them, that the people who see them might not even care. The precious treasure of writing simply for the sake of writing. And I suppose once I reclaim that magical moment, I’ll start writing novels again, and maybe I’ll even get my second novel published.

Yes, there was a first novel, published in August 2008. It sold about 30 copies on Amazon. Oddly, I didn’t get much feedback, so either the people who bought it didn’t read it, or the people that read it didn’t like it. I’ve only met seven people who admitted to reading it. Three didn’t like it, and two had slept with me, so they’re probably biased. The final two know me really well, so they gave me detailed notes on the parallels between me and my lead character … without actually saying if they liked the book or not.

This is the part where I’m supposed to say buy my book. So … buy my book 🙂 And if you do read it, please tell me what you thought of it. Meanwhile, I’m off in search of a bitchy muse, the kind that will push me to write regardless of who is reading, or whether anyone is reading at all, because I really do miss that feeling. Maybe while said muse it at it, he can steer me back towards poetry.

As I wait, it may be a good idea to sift through my blog drafts. I see a lot of incomplete thoughts in there, and who knows, they just might be the seeds to a truly good story. Or even a soap or mini-series, because I’m toying with that as well. I recently worked on a project that broke my heart a million different ways. Well okay, maybe five different ways. I’ve spent the past few days trying to figure out the point of it all, because I don’t believe in the random.

My conclusion is a discussion for another post … which I started writing yesterday, and might finish at some point. For now, my clothes are soaked, the church bell is ringing, and there’s a hair care brief on my desk. Also, this weather is perfect for making babies, so wear gloves, play safe, and keep warm. Good weekend all 🙂

♫ A message ♫ Coldplay ♫