Aghhhh, I Can't Do It! And Other Lies My Brain Yells at Me
When I visit my own blog (yes, sometimes I do that), I can’t help but scroll past the posts I’ve written and think “Damn. This girl is prolific.” The amount of ideas and bright, honest pieces is briefly astounding to me, as if I’m admiring my own work through someone else’s much kinder eyes.
I visit my own blog because sometimes I need a reminder that I can, in fact, write. And not only that I can write, but that I can write well. Maybe not objectively well, considering the fact that I can not even venture a guess at what a gerund or dangling participle is (have I just made one?), but “well” in a way that feels kickass and right when I reread pieces I’ve written.
I can write, and yet nearly every weekend and most nights after work, I beat myself up for seemingly not being able to write. I feel like I just can’t do it in the same way a toddler who technically knows how to tie his own shoes fumbles with the laces in his fat fingers and can’t remember if the bunny goes through the hole or directly into traffic but what he does know with every bone in his body is that he simply CAN’T. DO. IT.
On the days when it becomes clear to me that absolutely no writing is getting done, sometimes I concede and attempt to “relax” by doing laundry and calling my people and going to the florescent squeaky-wheeled hell that is the grocery store, and other times I decide instead to double down on the self-loathing and, to put it simply, become a total grouch.
This was me all of Saturday until approximately 6:30PM, which is normally the beginning of the end of my day, when I make and eat dinner, take a shower, read, and check my Gcal for the next day like the task addict that I am. But by sitting down to write “late,” I figured I would at least feel a teensy bit better if I put some words on the page, even if those words turned out to be rambling, ragey, desperate, obvious garbage.
So, I did.
I had made an entire day of self-aghhhhhing (though I did step outside every few minutes for some sunlight, until I quickly remembered why no one sits outside in the 100-degree heat) before I finally wrote anything at all.
I took my dog to the park and told several other doggos who came to sniff me that they were the goodest boys until my own very good boy became jealous and forced them aside with his rump. Later, I ate some goldfish crackers on the couch and picked miniature fights with my partner and chuckled at myself while doing it, having learned of course that I am not mad at him, but he is right there and I am mad, so.
I then hustled around doing stupid tasks like laundry and dishes and steering the Roomba with my foot to the rooms I actually wanted it to go in that it continued to not go in, seemingly on purpose to irritate me more. Every hour or so I sat down with my journal and a pen to hash things out, which is to say: scribble some nonsense and become so angry at myself that I decided to take a revenge nap for 30 minutes but really only until awoken abruptly by the tiny dust butler ramming into the couch.
I spent a whole day simmering with rage and self doubt, until I grabbed a beer out of the fridge and sat down at my desk, opened my laptop, closed all tabs and silenced all devices, and I let go and let Guy Fieri.
My typing eventually went from nonsensical to magical, and I relaxed just a little into self trust, making a mental note to learn something from this experience while knowing in my bones that I definitely will not.
I didn’t finish any of the three freelance projects on my plate, but I did wrangle my brain for enough time to produce something that I mostly liked and remind myself that I don’t totally suck.
I hope one day I will work myself out of this evil cycle of “I CAN’T,” followed hours later by pleasant surprise that sometimes I can, but who’s to say. Every artist has their process.
Instead of booze and cigarettes and leaning dramatically against buildings and nights spent typing furiously until the sun rises, I have an exceptionally clean home, overly-nurtured relationships, and a comically loud brain.
But still, I can write.
Sometimes. I think.
Yours,
Emily Rose // Miss Magnolia