June 29, 2008

• Back from the world, once again…

  I guess it’s time to confess that I feel like I have somewhat been abandoning this blog, for the past year or so. It hasn’t really been anything very conscious… more a combination of “life getting in the way,” and a sense that a lot of my old friends from here are– in a similar fashion– not contributing the way they used to.
  
  It’s not really that I don’t want to be here, it’s more a lingering feeling of “been there, done that” arising, almost every time I sit down to write.
  
  I was traveling again, this month. I barely got back from the family visit in Spain before turning right around and heading out for a week to a retreat in northern California. In between, I had to make time to “make a living,” which is something I have been trying to give priority to, this year. Or, at least, it’s something I have been trying to “take seriously,” this year. Now that I am back, I once again have to give priority to “making a living.” It’s just one of those things, when you’re self-employed.
  
  One of the things I noticed at the retreat is the degree to which people– on a very broad scale– get trapped in a pattern of “complaining about life.” I recognize that pattern– as well as the fact that when I spent a lot more time writing on this site, it was usually because I was bellyaching about something, and trying to work my way through some “issue.” It also seems to hold true that my inclination to keep up with my blogs has declined, as I have moved more towards a phase of life where I feel like I am merely “living,” rather than at odds with my environment, and the greater circle of life.
  
  This morning– as I was waiting for the coffee to kick in– I ended up contemplating the “how” of writing, and the broader mechanics of how human beings relate to each other. And I recognized just how much writing is about “problems” and “problem solving.” And it really applies– if you think about it– to a HUGE range of writing, from the Bible, to paparazzi scandal news. It applies to how we relate. We connect over what shitty weather we’re having, and over the state of the economy, and hating the government, and Bob losing his job. And those who speak mostly to “beauty and good” quickly get labeled as “Pollyannas” and are told they’d just better be prepared for the other shoe to drop.
  
  What I find funny (and perhaps a little ironic) is that everyone seems to be in pursuit of the Holy Grail of happiness, yet “good news doesn’t sell.” We’re quick to forget someone’s good fortune, and quick to pounce on anyone’s MISfortune. We read about people’s trials and tribulations on the path to self-awareness, but hear little or nothing from the people who “got there.” Maybe they are too busy being happy to tell us about it… OR they are afraid they’ll have their hard-earned contentment “stolen” by those envious of their progress.
  
  And I’m not holding myself above reproach, here, by the way. After all– (in the words of Simon Cowell) “when I have to be completely honest” about it– when I am not writing here, much, it’s often because I don’t have anything to complain about. AND… on some secondary level… because I find that I “devalue” the importance of the positive… saying to myself “nobody’s going to want to hear about that,” if I’m not penning some kind of lament.
  
  Much has been written about how great poetry, song lyrics and literature is born out of the writer’s pain and suffering. And I have previously pondered the question of whether or not it is possible to “write well” when your life is in balance and harmony.
  
  Beats me.
  
  I do know that I love to write, yet struggle to get the words out, absent a “challenge” or “problem.”
  
  Where the hell IS everybody, anyway?
  

  • 1:53 pm
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