You know how sometimes you’re just tired? And you probably have the energy to do something. But only something completely indulgent, like eating a hostess cupcake on the couch and watching “Bring It On”? And then you think, well, that’s better than playing Candy Crush on your iPad and not beating the level (again) and then taking a nap, right? Because giving yourself a break and refreshing your mind plus Jesse Bradford?
Mostly I feel like that a lot. Only I also want to play Candy Crush. Play Candy Crush while I eat a cupcake and also watch Jesse Bradford. On the couch. With a warm blanket. And slippers. Also maybe you could make me a hot chocolate.
I need a home. I need to travel. I need a break. I need to work. I need to take on more projects, fewer projects. I want to experience the world. I want to hole up in a warm corner away from the world. I should write. Why should I write? Why can’t I write concurrently with my life like everyone else in the world who has ever existed has done? Well, except Emily Dickinson. Oh, and Thoreau. But other than those two, everyone can multitask.
You see how I get exhausted and need the cupcake and so on.
Sometimes I think: OK, here’s what I should do. I should just write a novel. Because as much as I always say I aspire to write a novel, I’ve never really been a novel writer. I’ve been more of a random writer. I write random things at random times, randomly along with all of the other million plates I’m spinning. So maybe I need to just force myself into a linear structure and set aside an hour every day and start at the beginning and write every hour until I get to the end.
And then I’ll either have a novel or know I never want to write a novel or will have wrestled the competing voices in my head into all talking about the same thing. Or about not as many conflicting things. Or maybe they’ll be be quieter.
In another place I’m writing than here, several people have told me that my writing is funny. Which if you read my writing here, that might strike you as funny. Because reading here, you’d wonder if I even have heard of humor, of the idea of anything being funny.
Maybe an hour-a-day forced novel would be free of all the compartmentalization I spend so much time trying to keep in place. Which is also exhausting, now that I think of it.
Along with the effort it takes to keep away the proverbial wolves at the door, who seem to have a larger presence than their proverbs would imply. And to keep the world turning. Food on the table. Bacon for the pan and rest.
You’d eat a cupcake too.