The Thursday! Newsletter 2-16: Silly Things and Desire
Volume 2, Issue 16
I'd like to talk about silly things this week.
Now I don't mean things that are silly in the traditional sense -- a duck in a sailor's outfit singing opera, for instance -- but silly in the sense of what clashes with the public image we each build for ourselves.
I wandered around that definition, didn't I? Let me be more direct. Every one of us is afraid to look ridiculous. Unfortunately, because we are artists, we always run the risk of looking ridiculous. We dip into the giddy joy of imagining a swing is a jet fighter or point out the slim shadow that could be the tendril of the monster that lives in the closet. We look at a flower like it's the only beauty we have ever seen or tear our hearts open and paint the page with gallons of spilled love. None of these pursuits are "serious" as the grown-up world reckons seriousness. We are not performing brain surgery, fixing a busted axle, baking loaves of delicious bread, crunching numbers on a balance sheet, or loading up yet another web site with high-value keywords.
Instead, we conjure fountains of wonder and invite the world to splash in them. We write love letters, fold them into paper airplanes, and chuck them out the window knowing that they may reach no one at all. We wear our hearts on our sleeves like insignias of rank and we dare the world to think less of us.
Well, sometimes we do. Other times -- and in my case, most of the time -- we worry and fret and hesitate. We close the lid on the shining piece of wonder we've imagined because we are afraid no one else will love it. We don't share our best and most true art because if we do, and someone hates it, it will feel like they hate us. We fear that most of all. That would shatter us and though we might put ourselves back together, how many times should that happen before we can't? Maybe this hate is the hate that wrecks us for good. Maybe.
Or maybe not.
Yesterday, I read an article about the Spanish word ganas, which means "desire" in English. The author wrote about how in order to do anything worthwhile, we have to have a desire to accomplish it. The desire is what powers us through difficulties, especially the difficulties we build ourselves, like the difficulty of silliness. The trick (if you want to call it that) is to have more desire than fear. Sounds easy, doesn't it? Lots of people make truckloads of money selling people on that one simple trick. Just want it! You gotta want success more than you fear failure! You gotta ignore humiliation because you're so awesome all by yourself! Buy my book with all the secrets of wanting and hustling and not giving up!
Yeah. Bollocks to all that. Desire is amazing and powerful but it ain't easy. You can "just want it" all you want, but there's a big difference between "wanting" and "doing" and any desire is empty if it doesn't include moving toward what you want. Action is the thing. Doing something is what turns desire into useful power. As it happens, doing something is also what quiets the insidious whispers of worry. I know this because I've recently noticed something about myself and my fears.
I am most afraid when I'm not working on my art.
The past week and a half has been miserable in my own head. Also, I have written very little in the past week and a half. You could argue that my bout of depression dried up my writing, but I think it's the other way around. I've neglected my art and the fear has had its way with me. I get most depressed when I see no hope for better days ahead. I see no hope for better days ahead when I'm not writing because I don't believe my writing is going to get any meaningful traction. You see where the fear of being seen as silly falls in that progression? My stories and my poetry carries the most power when it comes from the Jimmiest part of me but I am also the most vulnerable to feeling small and silly. I can write amazing poetry but I can also see myself as the kid who sat on the side of the kickball court because neither team wanted him. I can pull monsters from the shadows and pin them in the sunlight with the best of them but I can also blush hot with embarrassment when the popular kid laughs at the rocket ship I drew.
I think maybe that's you, too, at least a little. You're an artist. You walk the line between cocky and cowering. You finish a story on the top of the world and a week later you think it's an affront to the world of fiction. Your painting is nigh-Picasso today and barely a toddler's finger painting project tomorrow. Worse, those extremes happen inside you head before you even start your next silly thing. They are, however, extremes. The truth lies between them. Let me tell you what I think:
You will make something cool or you will not.
People will like the thing you make or they will not.
You will make another thing, which will probably be silly.
You are an artist. Make the "you-est" thing you can.
I guess I didn't talk very much about silly things this week, did I? Just the one silly thing: me. Okay, and maybe you. That's more than one. But I have one more. I'm going to start a project that might be very silly or it might not. That's all I'll say about it until it's closer to finished, except for this one other thing.
I desire to make it happen very much.
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What I Wrote Last Week
"Crisp" is a short poem about a moment we've all experienced, I'm sure.
"Aldon Shumley's Subway Ride" is a not-nice story about a man on a train. Or maybe he's a hero. Which way do you read it?
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