Story of a Womanizer: Day 12
1.22.15
Day 12
I’m not sure why, but Malaysia is really blowing it as a country. They have all the resources in the world but they operate like a third world nation. The wifi here is killing me. They won’t even let me download something that is 77MB! That’s like a picture for god’s sake.
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Update, after sending our small but powerful assistant Lily to the front desk to threaten them about wifi they were able to reset it and allow me to download Scrivener. Now I can outline the chapters of my next novel on postcards.
I’m having a hard time writing stories that are longer than 3,000 words or so. I don’t have the focus. My writing style is something like sending in a 2 million member standing army to deal with a noise complaint. Spray bullets everywhere and until all bases have been covered. But where’s the craft?
Being a productive artist (meaning I produce more content than most and actually make money doing it) has always given me something to brag about. Like, “Look at all those whiny emo fuckers reading all those damn books by Proust or some other unrelatable prick. I am so much better than them.” Now that’s true, for the most part. There’s nothing more irritating than listening to some pretentious little wienie talk about what art should be. I’d rather hear them talk about what they’ve produced. As in, don’t criticize or jump in the conversation of artists when you’re still a pretender.
But after I’m done being pissed that I’m only slightly more advanced than these people I’ll move onto real artistry. As in, I’ll master a craft. I’ve skated by so long on natural talent. It doesn’t take me long to get good at something. But if I had to pick one thing I was great at, I couldn’t. During each creative project there are moments when I could do a little more, make it a little better, but I don’t, because my work is good enough and nobody else will notice that I could have done more.
Is that critical? Maybe. But what I’m talking about are the moments when I pretend that I’m ok with doing what I’ve already done.
I’ve wanted to outline this script for months. I’ve had the story in my head for a year. A man’s struggle to be faithful. A story I could write well. It’s a choice everyone has to make. And not an easy choice. But what if I could write a character that was just balls out fucking awful and then somehow completely relatable? What an exercise as a writer.
But here’s what happens – I don’t do it. Because once I start then it’ll be just another thing I have to finish and when I don’t finish it’ll be just another reason to not believe I will ever be the kind of person I want to be.
There are tactical factors. Simple things that I need to make projects and life easier. I need to download Scrivener because it allows me to write a story in a visual manner instead of one straight line down a word doc where I lose everything and it all folds in together.
So Malaysia, fix your fucking wifi already because I started the story the other night. Because I stopped being a bitch and I wrote, “Chapter 1.” And a full chapter came out and it felt good. Which caused me to journal, “Remember this, because you seem to keep forgetting, remember how you feel right now after you’ve written this chapter. This is obviously what you were born to do. Please don’t forget this. And if you do, please read this again.”
Regardless of documented evidence that proves my love for writing and creating I will still hesitate to write Chapter 2. I would rather sit still because of fear that it won’t be a good story.
This is a story that I’m afraid to write. People close to me will wonder if it’s about them and if it’s based on true stories. For the last two years I’ve been making notes in my phone about opportunities I’ve had that would allow me to play this character in real life.
A person with options has to make a choice. It may seem like they can have everything, but they can’t. The decisions they make will determine the type of people they are surrounded with. If they play the insecure game they will hurt everyone they come in contact with and they will be empty inside.
