Fuck if I know what to write about today.
It doesn't really matter, anyway. Nobody's going to read it, at least not any time soon. I'm only writing this to keep up the illusion of forward progress in my mind.
As long as you're writing and as long as you're putting out new material you're at least opening the door to the possibility that someone will read it. Which, really, might be the whole reason I write in the first place. It's the one place where you can at least try to let all the complexity out in the hope that someone, somewhere will understand.
Always hoping for those moments when a complete stranger sees the most hidden and unacceptable parts of yourself and thinks, “Oh, thank God I'm not the only one.”
Also because the moment I stop writing is the moment I start actively coming up with ways to destroy myself. All the contempt and the spite I have for myself (since I'm the only one I really care about) comes boiling to the surface and I start looking for little ways to hurt myself. Nothing overt, really, it's in bad taste. But I distract myself from myself with a million things I don't particularly enjoy.
Twitter, for one thing. Of course I tell myself I'm on Twitter because it's a way to sell books. But instead of using it systematically I use it as a way to feel deprived because no one seems to want to connect with me.
Porn is another. Especially the variety where a woman calling herself Goddess something-or-other puts on lingerie and verbally abuses the camera. Things along the lines of, “Look at what you'll never have. No woman like me would ever let herself be so much as touched by a loser like you.” I wallow in the hopelessness of it all and probably use it as an excuse not to try to connect with anybody in real life.
Drinking alone is another. Mostly on weekends. It's a way of ensuring that I sleep later than I meant to and feel so much contempt for myself on Saturday that I don't get everything done that I'd planned on doing. A way of numbing myself for a while so I don't have to feel my emotions. A way to feel like enjoying life is something you can simply consume–it's a drink that makes you feel good!–rather than something you have to put real effort into.
There's a sense in which I cling to the feeling of being cut off from something wonderful. A way I savor the desolation of it. Probably I do it because it's easy. If you have low expectations of yourself you can forgo the effort and the discomfort of becoming who you ought to be and have it in yourself to be.
Or maybe it's just the opposite. Maybe I have such unbelievably high expectations for myself that I'm bound to fall short, no matter what I do. And since the feeling that I don't measure up is a constant companion, maybe it's not so surprising that I start to draw some indecent enjoyment from it. It's the way I want to feel about myself, isn't it?
Maybe so.
This isn't going to be interesting to anyone but me. You're supposed to write hopeful and uplifting things in blogs, or tell other writers how you sold a million books and how they can do the same. Or at least you're supposed to pretend to be the kind of man who thinks he could beat a tiger in a knife fight. Confidence is sexy, you know?
There's a reason I only enjoy writing fiction. In fiction it's perfectly all right to write about self-loathing people and their self-destructive habits. Lately I've been posting reviews on the blog, which also has a lot to recommend it. Gives you something else to focus on and maybe helps a fellow author sell a few more copies.
But I can't read fast enough to do a review every week. So I end up with these off weeks where it seems like I inevitably end up airing my dirty laundry. “You really think this is gonna have people tripping over themselves to buy your book, Geof?” No, but I'm working on it.
I've already told you a million times that I'm still working out what this blog needs to be. And I have made some progress on that front in the last three months. But posts like this don't need to be the focus of the blog. They give entirely too accurate an impression of my character and personality.
“Don't use self-deprecating humor, it makes you look insecure.” Well, God forbid I let anybody know who I really am!
Anyway, what I'm saying is that I write posts like this every other week because I've promised myself to do a blog post every Sunday. But I kind of resent the need for a blog, so I do a bad job at it out of spite. I've started posting the fiction stories on Wednesdays, and that keeps me busy enough that I simply haven't gotten around to coming up with a solid concept for these posts.
So if you're getting the impression that this whole post is one long explanation for why the post is bad… you need to go get your head checked because you've got me all wrong, baby.
And if you're getting the impression I'm just making myself look bad as a way of letting the reader feel confidently superior to me… that's just crazy talk, you're nutso. More than likely I just get some bizarre enjoyment out of publicly posting the most unflattering version of myself and claiming it's the real me.
Like I said, the reason I'm doing this blog is to sell books. So go buy my book, it's a lot better than this lousy blog post.
And don't you worry, one of these days I'll come up with a decent sort of post for these off weeks.
Just not this week, apparently…
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