Spark in the Umbra

So here it is. I want to write a novel.

There. I’ve said it. Can’t take it back now.

And I’m both excited and daunted by the idea by turns. Because in between the wanting and the actual doing seems an almost unfathomable gulf.

What makes me think I’m so special that anyone will want to read what I write?

Sheesh, even these first few scribblings are incredibly derivative. Most of the books on writing I’ve been skimming and collecting seem to start with an exposition about the anxiety and vulnerability that reflects back like an echo after the initial impulse to write.

What if it’s all crap? What if people hate it? Or worse, what if no-one even cares? After all, the opposite of love is not hate, it’s apathy.

But there is another thing all those books on writing say too.

Just start writing.

Write every day. About nothing. About something. About anything.

A fading fragment of a dream (or nightmare), a snippet of conversation overheard, about not knowing what to write, it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t need to be ‘good’, in fact, don’t try to make it good – No-one else ever needs to see it. But just keep writing.

So here I am.

So why a blog? Well, in a way, it’s to stop me from wimping out on this whole writing thing, giving up before I’ve started. In fact, if you’re reading this, it means I did keep going, at least for a while. You see right now, this is just me typing into Wordpress after I’ve just installed it onto my laptop.

It hasn’t even seen the ‘light’ of the web yet.

My nascent writing effort’s first gasping breath, frantically flailing about, hoping to one day reach an audience of even one more person, if I don’t snuff it out before then out of cowardice.

It deserves better than that.

I have already bought a domain name. And that small financial commitment was to make me stick with this.

And now that I’ve installed Wordpress, I can see there is all these things I ‘need’ to learn about and tinker with. Themes, Colours, Fonts, Categories, Tags, Widgets.

I could agonize over just the right shade of grey, or getting just the right picture of my cat to stick in the header. Except that I don’t have a cat. One of the neighbours cats does come and regularly crap on my lawn though, which sort of counts. So you could say a cat has me. Anyway, I digress.

No fiddling with Wordpress or other more elaborate delaying tactics. I’ve just got to write. No ifs, buts, or maybes.

This entry was posted on Sunday, April 13th, 2008 at 8:28 pm and is filed under Writing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.