fruitless toil
It occurs to me that my December-long “novel” (more of a quick first draft to get ideas pinned down before they run away from me) has no tangible purpose, in that I am not trying to get published or pursue a career as an author.
But I think that it has clearly been bringing other intangible benefits. For one, I really like having something that is just mine. My own. No one to say it is good, bad, slow, fast, awkward, graceful. It’s just for me to judge and enjoy. Ok fine, I did let Seppo read parts of it. It’s mine, so I can do whatever I want with it. Heh. The other benefit is a littler weirder, but I think that it is good that Seppo sees me pursue a major project outside of work. Even though I have a lot of priorities that do not have deadlines, I think that to him, this is a “proof” of something to him — things I already knew, like I’m responsible, that I have my own internal coach for things I really care about, that when I make a real commitment that has meaning to me, that I keep it.
I know. It sounds weird. But even though I didn’t need it to prove it to myself, I think he needed to see it.
My own, mine, my precious. Gee, ins’t Ei-nyung sounding a bit, I don’t, Gollumish? Aren’t you possesed with writing this “novel”? It seems to make you dissapear into a paralel universes. Watch out for the I.
I was thinking the other day that I really miss college and I think one of the reasons is that I was forced to write. Sometimes it was good, sometimes it was useless drivel done merely to satisfy an assignment, but it was always writing. Now, if left to my own devices, the only thing I write is a blog.
I was rather disappointed with myself for having not actually gone through with the project, but I’m also very lazy so the disappointment didn’t last long. In the end, my overreaching desire to sit in front of the TV and watch Sex & the City and Coupling won out. Right now, I’m okay with that. I’m sure eventually I’ll have to do something that is really good and is really a form of expression that doesn’t entail me doing a weekend re-cap for my loyal readers.
As much as I’d like to say that I disagree with you, if I sit down (which I am) and think about it, I really can’t. I think a lot of why I’m really psyched you’re doing this is because you’re *really good* at it. Regardless of the sort of structure issues, what you’ve written is really damn good, and I’m really psyched you’re writing it because *I* get to read it.
But if I’m being honest, yeah, I’m glad to see you do it, in part because of the reasons you’ve listed. I suppose to some extent, that’s lousy, and I don’t deny it. Glad you’re doing it, though, totally disregarding those reasons, nonetheless.