So, the main reason I used to write a lot on here is that for a while there I was completely and utterly miserable. This was partly due to the job I had then, partly a few other problems, but largely because I had taken a very, very bad trip into the bleak and alcohol fuelled world of Mild to Severe Depression (it’s like Narnia, except that instead of walking through a wardrobe, you go through the cool-room of a bottle shop, and when you get there Mr. Tumnus is a bad-tempered, indecisive Welshman who patronises you and belittles you in meetings in front of all your colleagues).
I finally figured out what the trouble was (every damn time I fall down that hole it takes me months and months to recognise what the problem is), got some treatment (love you, Dr L!), left the world’s most awful job and basically just got myself together a bit.
But what’s shitty is that when I was so sad I could hardly get out of bed, words just flowed out of me. There were the ramblings here, and in my diary, and while I can’t say all or even some of it was any good, it was easy. Now that I’m content with my life, the words have dried up. Even writing book reviews, which I used to churn out at a rate of two of three a week, has become a painfully slow task. I’ve lost any drive to put things down because my head isn’t overflowing with stuff.
And in a similar vein, I find myself completely unable to read anything. A couple of months ago I was sucking down books, but now I find my mind wandering after the first paragraph. Which sucks. I can be sad but creative and receptive, or I can be happy and spend my downtime looking at videos on the internet and just generally letting my brain simmer in a warm, comforting broth of memes and recipe sites.
Aaaaanyway. I didn’t mean to get so intro-tedious. What I’m trying to say is that I want to find a happy medium, which I think will be more about getting into the habit of putting words down that aren’t about how sad I am.
I want to try and start writing a lot more; mainly because at the moment my brain is in danger of being totally overwhelmed by my job and I need to start doing something other than wake up-go to work-come home-sleep, and I think that setting any kind of target that isn't about looking at every page of whatever tumblr site I'm currently enamored with will be helpful. So, following the example of one of my favourite blogs, where the author quite often has posts just called Twenty Lines, and I’m going to set myself a target of writing at least two hundred words at least four times a week. It’s not really for anyone except myself, but I find that writing a private diary on its own tends to end up incredibly solipsistic, even more so that the stuff that gets put up here, and just becomes a repetitive litany of grievances. Maybe if I was Evelyn Waugh that might one day be of some interest to someone, but as it is, I need the structure of writing for a (hypothetic) audience, because at least then I feel the need to find new things to say, even if they aren’t especially interesting.
So look for more slightly less self involved than my diary but still pretty self involved stuff here on a more regular basis. Or don’t.
