A-holes and Warning Track Power
Talked to my grandparents this morning. How do you tell your grandparents you think their son is an asshole, and you don't want to spend Christmas with them at his house? I'm an asshole, too, I guess. Assholiness has got to be hereditary. Some study will come out proving which chromosome the asshole gene is handed down on. A lot of people have it.
It's like wanting to be a writer. Where does that come from? It might be intertwined with the asshole gene. It's all well and good when you think you're a funny guy with interesting things to say, but then when you sit down and actually try to make yourself write something funny or interesting, you find out that really all you are is an asshole. With shit coming out of it. And then you just want to stop. "Screw writing," you think. "I should just go have a beer and watch football at a bar, and do something worthwhile, like shoot some pool." I guess I'm enough of a narcissist, though, that I push on with it, even when, like usual, there's nothing to say. But if I waited around for something worthwhile to say before I wrote, I wouldn't be writing. So I force myself to write these three pages every day, shitty or not. Usually the former. I just want to do it and be done with it. It's weird, too, because I can see there are some complex issues that might bear exploring, but I don't want to put the psychological effort into examining any of them. I'll write, but you can't force me to write well.
Is it that my skills aren't up to my standards? Just like everything. I'm almost, but not quite, good enough. I know it's egotistical to talk about IQ, but mine, I was told in fifth grade, was 139. They sent me off to the "gifted" school, for nerds and f-gs. Anyway, 139. Genius IQ, I'm told, begins at 140. Isn't that funny? That sums me up. He's a smart guy, but 's no genius. If you have to hit a baseball four hundred feet, for a homer, I hit 'em 399. Warning track power. It's the same with my writing. Sometimes, it's good, but that's all, and good isn't good enough. Especially when the enjoyment is absent. But you can't only do a thing like writing only when you enjoy it. You have to do it when you don't feel like it. Like an olympic athlete.
In sixth grade Mr. Webb said my vocabulary tested beyond high school level, but that hasn't helped me to communicate. You've got to talk the way people talk.
I already said I'm an asshole, so I might as well say that if you've dummied down the way you talk so you can be understood by people, if you've done it to the point where it's a habit, then you can't have an intelligent conversation with an itelligent person when you're with one. You can't come up with fresh terms of expression.
I need to maintain some convictions, other than the legal kind. I've got to make a plan and stick with it. Always be moving toward my best even if it's baby steps. In 1996, I'll do whatever it takes, I'll do it long enough and hard enough to reach my goal of becoming a professional writer. I'll centralize my necessities to this end. I'll get a job closer to home and eliminate two hours of being stuck in the car from my life everyday. I'll write two short stories, and a novella, I'll get my credential and BCLAD, I'll do a part in one student film, and I'll only go on one trip this year, either Alaska or Florida. I already smell the bullshit. Should I do the Crack story or the Border or the Cold one or what? Ski bop doo diddly wop. Done.
It's like wanting to be a writer. Where does that come from? It might be intertwined with the asshole gene. It's all well and good when you think you're a funny guy with interesting things to say, but then when you sit down and actually try to make yourself write something funny or interesting, you find out that really all you are is an asshole. With shit coming out of it. And then you just want to stop. "Screw writing," you think. "I should just go have a beer and watch football at a bar, and do something worthwhile, like shoot some pool." I guess I'm enough of a narcissist, though, that I push on with it, even when, like usual, there's nothing to say. But if I waited around for something worthwhile to say before I wrote, I wouldn't be writing. So I force myself to write these three pages every day, shitty or not. Usually the former. I just want to do it and be done with it. It's weird, too, because I can see there are some complex issues that might bear exploring, but I don't want to put the psychological effort into examining any of them. I'll write, but you can't force me to write well.
Is it that my skills aren't up to my standards? Just like everything. I'm almost, but not quite, good enough. I know it's egotistical to talk about IQ, but mine, I was told in fifth grade, was 139. They sent me off to the "gifted" school, for nerds and f-gs. Anyway, 139. Genius IQ, I'm told, begins at 140. Isn't that funny? That sums me up. He's a smart guy, but 's no genius. If you have to hit a baseball four hundred feet, for a homer, I hit 'em 399. Warning track power. It's the same with my writing. Sometimes, it's good, but that's all, and good isn't good enough. Especially when the enjoyment is absent. But you can't only do a thing like writing only when you enjoy it. You have to do it when you don't feel like it. Like an olympic athlete.
In sixth grade Mr. Webb said my vocabulary tested beyond high school level, but that hasn't helped me to communicate. You've got to talk the way people talk.
I already said I'm an asshole, so I might as well say that if you've dummied down the way you talk so you can be understood by people, if you've done it to the point where it's a habit, then you can't have an intelligent conversation with an itelligent person when you're with one. You can't come up with fresh terms of expression.
I need to maintain some convictions, other than the legal kind. I've got to make a plan and stick with it. Always be moving toward my best even if it's baby steps. In 1996, I'll do whatever it takes, I'll do it long enough and hard enough to reach my goal of becoming a professional writer. I'll centralize my necessities to this end. I'll get a job closer to home and eliminate two hours of being stuck in the car from my life everyday. I'll write two short stories, and a novella, I'll get my credential and BCLAD, I'll do a part in one student film, and I'll only go on one trip this year, either Alaska or Florida. I already smell the bullshit. Should I do the Crack story or the Border or the Cold one or what? Ski bop doo diddly wop. Done.
posted by johnz at 7:21 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home