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pegkerrI stood in the kitchen tonight, listening to Fiona pitch a tantrum in the living room over her report on Italy. (She became unglued when we told her that she would undoubtedly not be able to type up all the pages she had written in time to hand it all in when it is due tomorrow. She cannot type that fast, no matter how much she insisted that she could. And of course, crying hysterically as she was, she wasn't writing it by hand very fast, either.)
Too depressed to even face making dinner, I poured myself a fingerwidth of Baileys Irish Creme and meditated gloomily on fig trees, or at least the fig tree in the text from the gospel text this past Sunday (Luke 13:6-8):
My fig tree is bearing no fruit. I am not writing my novel. I don't want to work on it, I just want to dive into reading fiction to escape the stress of my life. I thought about applying the text to my situation, trying to make myself write the book in a year, but I couldn't even find it within myself to make that much of a commitment, which I found utterly depressing. Hence, the Baileys. How long can I continue to call myself a writer if I am not working on fiction? At what point do they come and cut my fig tree down? I hold my day job, as badly matched to my skills and temperament as it is, on the basis of the argument that, well, it's all right that I'm a legal secretary, because I'm really a writer. I just don't write fast enough to pay the bills; this takes care of those. But if I'm not writing at all, what then? If I'm not a writer, what am I?
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elisem, I'm never gonna get to wear that necklace that I had promised myself for finishing the ice palace book.
All I want to do is read. Compulsively, obsessively. Not write. And I feel like such an utter fraud when people say I'm a writer.
Too depressed to even face making dinner, I poured myself a fingerwidth of Baileys Irish Creme and meditated gloomily on fig trees, or at least the fig tree in the text from the gospel text this past Sunday (Luke 13:6-8):
A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard; and he came seeking fruit on it and found none. And he said to the vinedresser, 'Lo, these three years I have come seeking fruit upon this fig tree, and I find none. Cut it down; why should it use up ground?' And he answered him, 'Let it alone, sir, this year also, till I dig about it and put on manure. And if it bears fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down.'I thought about the ambiguity in this story that I always see. The gospel text is both a reprieve (wait a year) and a threat (and if it doesn't bear in a year, cut it down).
My fig tree is bearing no fruit. I am not writing my novel. I don't want to work on it, I just want to dive into reading fiction to escape the stress of my life. I thought about applying the text to my situation, trying to make myself write the book in a year, but I couldn't even find it within myself to make that much of a commitment, which I found utterly depressing. Hence, the Baileys. How long can I continue to call myself a writer if I am not working on fiction? At what point do they come and cut my fig tree down? I hold my day job, as badly matched to my skills and temperament as it is, on the basis of the argument that, well, it's all right that I'm a legal secretary, because I'm really a writer. I just don't write fast enough to pay the bills; this takes care of those. But if I'm not writing at all, what then? If I'm not a writer, what am I?
elisem, I'm never gonna get to wear that necklace that I had promised myself for finishing the ice palace book.All I want to do is read. Compulsively, obsessively. Not write. And I feel like such an utter fraud when people say I'm a writer.