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Friday, March 30, 2012

The Story I Cannot Write

I am an aspiring authoress.  I have been since middle school when my friends and I wrote stories on notebooks and passed them between us throughout the school day.  I always knew that my friends had a lot more talent and ability but I figured that at least my desire would make up for it.

I kept writing.

It's been 16  years since I was that middle school girl, passing notebooks and pouring my heart into made up characters and plotlines.  I still keep those notebooks in a box and I pull them out every so often as a reminder of the emotions I put into those stories and as a reminder of the dream of becoming a real authoress.

Writing is not easy for me.  Someone - William Faulkner - once said that a writer has to write because they can't not write.  I am that type of writer.  I don't write because I have talent and wonderful ideas that come spewing off the page.  I write because to not write hurts.  I write because my soul won't let me do anything else until I've expressed something in words.

The result of all of my writing though is this: a dozen unfinished short stories, three unfinished novels, and a dozen poems.  I pull out the bits of novels for bedtime stories to read to friends who are stressed or sick.  I pull out the short stories on those nights when the writing demon has gotten me and I think that I must surely finish something.  None of it is brilliant - in my nicest moments, they are like old friends who bring a smile to my face of good memories and in my most critical moments, they are raw and ugly brainchildren, proof of my limited ability.

I never finish anything.  I'm starting to wonder if I ever will.

However, in all of this, I keep writing.  Because I must.

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