A book?
Thursday, January 17, 2008
I guess if you paid any attention to this blog you noticed that I like to write. Sometimes it's all that keeps me sane. Sometimes it is the only outlet I have. And sometimes the blog is like the only person I have to talk to.
And like most people who like to write think they have a novel in them. I have been kicking around ideas for years. Nobody seems to get my main idea besides me, which is OK. I don't mind that. I just want to get it out of my system.
But people who know me tell me that that novel is not what I should write. What they want to read is my life story. Hell, read early comments to the blog. People though the original stories were just a novel being tried out. People especially want the story from my first divorce forward. They probably want the whole shooting match, but I am not going to write about my marriage. I feel like that would be wrong.And, as I have said, I won't write about my second marriage either.
That leaves a lot of very interesting stories, but no ending. There is no happy ending, and there is no tragic ending. All I have are the stories. Some people like the stories. Some people find them offensive. Some people think I am talking about them. And some of those people are right. But that just doesn't sound like a book to me. Then again, "The Secret" was a bestseller and basically all it says is to have a positive attitude and focus on your goals. It's a short book but, shit, I could say that in a greeting card.
So I have considered writing something that just doesn't include my marriages. The problem is that it would leave such a hole. When you read the stories I used to always write you have no sense for why I did what I did and how I got that way. I could fix that but it would mean including my childhood (making me look like a victim) and my first marriage (where I was an asshole and I am not willing to exploit that relationship). And I just know that whatever comes next for me, leaving out my second marriage would leave the story so obviously incomplete that any reader would wonder what happened.
The thing is, I am beginning to think I need to write and write it all. The whole mess. I feel like it has to all be compiled in one place to get it out and get over it. I am haunted by my past and I don't think anyone understands because nobody knows the whole thing. Even in therapy you can't tell the whole story. It is too long and complicated. 40 minutes at a time, including the bullshit from the therapist, would make it take years. And I realize now that I don't have years. To have this all bottled up is asking for trouble. While I am strangely calm right now, I know that is not a permanent condition for me. It is simply a pause in a storm. If I truly want to stop living from emotional storm to emotional storm, I need get the eye of the storm out of my soul.
So I am faced with a great decision and a monumental task. And I have to get this right because I know my soul is on the line.
Labels: book, emotions, insanity, life, relationships, writing

