Oddities

It’s an odd thing for me to keep writing like this, with these obscure short stories. I don’t mean odd in the “look at that silly little man” kind of way. It’s just a supreme waste of time.

For those of you who’ve known me for a while you’re undoubtedly aware that I have not shown appreciable improvement over the last ten years. It feels better to say “ten years” instead of “decade.” I’ve never really kept up my output to the point where you’d expect improvement, so I’m not complaining. I’ve also never taken advantage of the absurd amount of options available for writers. Never a clinic or a group class. I just write my silly little stories.

I have gotten older in the last ten years, so conceivably I should have more to say than I did when I was younger. The truth is that I actually have much less to say now. In particular I have less to say about myself because I am no longer enamored with my own opinions. You could say that I’ve had the opposite emotional maturation to your typical politician.

I’d like to think that I have a more developed perspective of the world than I once did. I do think that I understand the world better, or better understand what I don’t really know. But I could just as easily have simply become more set in my old ways and no longer know the difference.

I don’t really know why I haven’t shown many signs of improvement. I don’t know why that doesn’t bother me. Odd.

Part of the problem is that I lack the inherent drive and talent necessary to become a successful writer. I’m at least a third of the way through my life (given my lifestyle,) and I’ve gone from the beginning to nowhere in my writing career. Let’s just say it hasn’t been an auspicious beginning. One of my favorite authors wrote his first novel at the tender age of 29. So that’s something.

I’m different from him and you cannot seriously consider the writing I do an art form. I’m not particularly creative. I’m not out to express myself. At best I’m working to express somebody else. If I needed to share my innermost thoughts or feelings I’d just say, “I think…” and be done with it. It’s not what I do or why I do it.

The stories I tell, and I do deeply love stories, are things you’ve heard before. I’m not quite so simple as to tell the boy meets girl, boy gets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl again and they live happily ever after kind of stories. It’s too bad really, since those are the stories most of us like to hear. I don’t generally go for traditional storyline, but I’d probably be better off if I worked in that direction. I seem to be drawn to writing stories where people are pushed into a corner and I’m not sure how to bring them out of it.

It shouldn’t really matter as far as the writing goes. A story is a story and has a beginning, middle, and end. The content shouldn’t overly affect the writing. Granted, I’ve struggled with the end part of the equation. But endings are the most important part to me, which makes them the hardest part. I’m drawn to the darker themes, and unfortunately I’m just not as good at them.

I’m at my best when I’m being observant about life and the events that shape our lives. I’m even better when I’m not trying too hard to be witty, which tends to be a flaw I often indulge. Trying too hard to do anything usually has unfortunate consequences. But I see the world a little differently from most people, and there’s a good chance that I’m making fun of those differences. That’s what makes me me, which is a little bit different from you. If I’m going to ever be truly creative, that’s where it would have to be. It’s the lighter side of life where I excel, when there is some kind of dialogue with a lighthearted repartee.

But there’s nothing funny about the things I’ve been writing about lately. So from the very beginning I abandon my only real strength. It wouldn’t be so bad if I didn’t know any better. At least then I could claim ignorance.

So it’s all odd, for these reasons and many others. But I keep plugging away and hope to continue strolling along. I don’t know why. Odd, isn’t it?