Continued, but no further along

So, months later, and where were we?

I am currently no further along - in my writing. However, the agency is growing, and we have taken on new clients and challenges since I last commented here. I have been buried deep in the world of detail and delivery. And it will continue for the foreseeable future.

But this isn't a bad thing. I'm really dedicated to the work we are doing at phunQube and to our clients. We're proud of our accomplishments, and I daresay, hope to continue with providing excellent service to our clients.

I've had little time for all else, though I have to say, since the last post, I have had to deal with a family tragedy back in the states, the flu, and other generally time-consuming and unhelpful issues. Through it all, I've had little time to concentrate on writing.

I have re-connected with an old friend in Brighton, a promising and currently publishing poet, and someone with whom I've been able to re-kindle conversations around that old bug of writing versus career, life versus creativity, etc. And as the year progresses, and the small things in life are worked out, I find my thoughts turning back to writing, and what I can do in the little bits of time that I have.

A friend's blog reminded me of something that Hemingway once said, though he used it in a different context than me.

'Writing, at its best, is a lonely life... For [the writer] does his
work alone and if he is a good enough writer he must face
eternity, or the lack of it, each day.' (Hemingway)

It is certainly lonely. As much as I have tried to see it as a more social endeavor - showing anything I've done to my partner or friends - at the end of the day, it is up to me to sit, and think, and understand, and finally to write what I think I understand down.

My problem where writing is concerned is that I have often put what I believe other people will think ahead of the actual writing, and in the end, thinking that I have guessed or intuited the will of others, I write something that is facile, devoid of any feeling, that sits flat on the page.

If I am to write again, it needs to come from me first. It needs life and blood to make it live. It needs inspiration, and indeed aspiration to make it bold. It should stand equally among those who read it, as individual and self-sustaining as its readers - some of whom will agree, some who will disagree, others who will feel inspiration, or aspire to be more because of it. But it cannot anticipate these things, or the thinking or reactions of these people. It must first be its own self, have its own substance.

I must first aspire to be myself, and be inspired by the things around me. I must live and breath my own air, and understand life even as I live it. I must be astonished by life, surprised by it. And sometimes be afraid of it. If I am to write again, I must feel all of these things. Then, perhaps I will have tools to choose from when I next sit down to write.