I wrote a song once. I didn’t know it was a song, it was just something I felt one morning waking up, and I wrote it down. Then my friend Dave Little asked if he could make it into a song. I shrugged, and I said sure. I was flattered he would ask.
Dave called the song When it all goes wrong, as it usually does, and he remained faithful to the title of my poem.
Someone whose opinion I respect challenged me on a comment I made to a visitor to my website. I had a chance to look at my actions from someone else’s point of view. I like to believe that I am hard on myself, and kindly towards others. This second look at something I had done embarrassed me.
A comment was made that my writing was better than someone else’s writing. I blanched, and wrote that what they thought of my writing was none of my business.
Did I really believe that that was not a compliment?
When I receive a compliment I do so with grace. Thank you, is usually sufficient. An acknowledgment of thanks given, and returned in kind. Compliment paid and received.
I am afraid of my ability, and I did not see the compliment for what it was. I lost an opportunity to extend kindness, and instead I created fear.
When it all goes wrong, as it usually does, the only answer is just because.
There is imitation, there is inspiration, and then there is just plain crap. I admit to being inspired. I can admit I write crap. I have often imitated. And when I am wrong, it is up to me to make it right.
I was just going to post another YouTube video. Blawgging for lazy bastards, as I’ve come to call it. Come look at my baby pictures of someone else’s children! You know? A testament to the blogging mentality. Hell, even my iPod mp.3 player just over yonder is broken, and half the songs won’t play, and I refuse to fix it.
So, instead I need to write from my heart just a bit. I don’t know that it’ll do any good. But it is what must be done. It’s what I need to say. I hate blawgs for this very reason. It’s why I don’t allow comments on my other site. When I write, I write for my own amusement. Comments aren’t really what I am fishing for. I am fishing for a release from …everything. I write because I must. Blahwging is a social sport, and I am a solitary being, a creature more comfortable alone.
Don’t I wish to be published? I’m not striving for it. It would take a great deal of re-working, and editing (a task I should only trust to my friend, Dr. Zen) to become publishable, and I don’t quite know that I’m up to it just yet. It’s like people who tell a funny friend: You should be a Comedian! Funny to friends, family , and co-workers, sure! A professional Comedian? That’s a horse of a different color.
Cute, pithy, short-sometimes-long little writings on an obscure internet site on the information superhighway? That’s fine. A published author with a website providing a glimpse into a reflection of their work? A horse of an entirely different color all together.
So comments about my writing leave me with a bland, and itchy feeling in my throat and mouth. Especially when held up to published authors who may have no chance to provide an equal voice in the matter.
Compliments are fine. But my writing needs strong legs before it can stand, and I feel that my work barely has any legs at all. I do appreciate the ooohs and awwws over my work, as anyone would appreciate admiring comments about pictures of their newborn. But mostly what you see at
are sketch books. Glimpses of where I want to go on the road up ahead.
And I haven’t even begun packing.
So, save your applause for the end.
And thank you, again. Thank you very, very much.
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Okay,
Father Luke
