This morning I sat down to write, a new pen in hand. The pen was a surprise gift from the friendly young post master at the post office in my hometown. But alas, the pen is too smooth, too slippery to hold and a ballpoint on top of that, meaning the ink is too slow to come out, unable to keep up with my rapidly forming thoughts.
The next pen I grab is cheap, with purple ink. That’s better. Since picking up the excellent book Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg last weekend, I’m feeling inspired to write with more regularity again. The book was recommended by an acquaintance and very helpful. Simultaneously practical and inspiring, it is incredible in its simplicity, without real “assignments”, but rather tips with clear directions. The author started the book with a short chapter on how to pick out your best notebook and pen. I have always chosen my journals with lots of attention paid to the format, hard vs. soft cover, the distance the lines are from one another, the smoothness of the paper. I agree that the book shouldn’t be too expensive (too much pressure to write something “perfect”); not too small in size (according to Goldberg, this promotes small thoughts, and indeed I once tossed a perfectly fine journal for that reason. It was cute and small, bound in pink leather with matching ribbon. More of a fashion accessory, I bought it thinking the small size would make it easy to take with me everywhere. But as soon as I sat down to write in it—at a French restaurant near my hometown that no longer exists—it felt too small, claustrophobic and worse of all, insignificant. I filled a few pages, then never returned to it again.
The author of the “Bones” also inspired me to spend less time worrying about what I want to be writing (novel, essay) but to simply write on a regular basis—the way I’m supposed to. Not because I have to or because someone is expecting me to, but simply because I’m a writer. I need to write, and have so all my life. Ever since I was gifted that little floral designed hard cover diary with the golden lock and key, I found a companion I couldn’t do without. This is where I made sense of things, of my thoughts and my experiences, and still do so to this day. I write; therefore I am a writer. It’s such a simple concept, yet it’s one I struggle with all the time.
I’m presently sitting at my desk, a cup of tea placed next to my journal. My desk is in the bedroom I share with my fiancé (this being a recent development, I’m still trying the term “fiancé” on for size). Through the French doors, I notice that it’s misty outside. The park-like grounds where we live are covered with low-hanging clouds, obscuring much of the trees. I normally keep my bedroom door closed, but today it’s open because two workmen are doing some repairs in the basement. In case they need me, the door is open. “Hello?” is how one of them addresses me when he has an announcement or a question regarding the job. This despite the fact that I introduced myself. Seemingly intensely uncomfortable to be in my home for whatever reason (because I’m a woman and I’m home alone?) he doesn’t seem to remember my name, nor does he seem to want to know.
My tea is ginger and licorice, with honey. I put in a few sage leaves from the garden. I woke up with a migraine and sage is supposed to help with migraines. It’s been years since my last migraine, maybe twenty years. So long ago in fact, that I initially wrote off the symptoms. The blind spots when I was texting with my love from our bed, and afterward, when I was standing at the kitchen sink making my coffee, the vibrations in my peripheral vision. The symptoms felt strangely familiar, and were followed by the familiar headache on the forehead and temples stretching all the way to the insides of my ears. Thankfully, the pain subsided almost as rapidly as they came on, either because of or despite the sage tea. Was it my recent stress that caused the migraines? Is it the constant pressure I put on myself that brought on the symptoms?
I work from home as a graphic designer for a boutique real estate firm in upstate New York, and things are quiet at work this time of year. The feeling of purposeless is one that I fight constantly. I know rationally that I am not my job. I know that my job is what I do, what I do to survive, to support my child, myself, and to contribute to my family. We all have to work. I have had to do much worse things for money in my lifetime. Yet, dissatisfaction nags at me like a begging dog, making eyes at me constantly, never seizing to demand my absolute attention, until I’ve fulfilled the desire. What is it that feels so urgent? What is this desire?
The identification with our work is deeply engrained into the American culture. It is often the first question people ask upon meeting someone new. “What do you do for a living?” Even in the English language itself, there is hardly a difference between the words “work” and “living”. In fact, they are interchangeable: “Life” and “living” as in “working for a living”. Work and living seem to be one and the same.
In Dutch, my native language, work and life are two distinctly different terms. “Leven” and “werken.” I grew up in a small farming village in the southern Netherlands close to the Belgian border, and in this environment, people’s jobs were of much lesser importance than I’m used to in this country. What characterized a person, are things like their hobbies, what they were a part of, be it the choir at the church, neighborhood association, soccer league, youth group, or what have you. This was especially so the case in my parents’ generation, but even in the case of my brothers, their work isn’t discussed nearly as much as say, music and films they enjoyed, vacations they’ve recently taken, their children’s developments. Their interests and their jobs are not one and the same. Not by a long shot.
It could be that the reason is that I grew up in a blue collar environment . Maybe people’s jobs were simply not that interesting. They certainly didn’t seem to be the most interesting part of someone’s personality or characteristic.
I’m distracted by the repairmen.