Writing journal Sept 10 2015

Writing journal. Entry of September 10, 2015.

Who thought keeping a journal could be so hard?! Joe Sacco writes in his introduction to Safe Area Gorazde, “Keeping a journal when working in the field is as essential as it is laborious.” I am not “in the field,” at least not in a field like Gorazde. But still, I have convinced myself that keeping a journal is essential – I am just now finding out how laborious it is…

(My field is my life and the one I observe around me. I say “I observe” and not the one that “is” around me; I know nothing about what is, only about what I observe/create in my mind – the actions of observing and creating are deeply entangled and indistinguishable. I want to write less about my life and more about the one I observe around – but I am not yet in the needed state of mind. I am still drowning in my own sadness and until I don’t learn to breathe in it, I won’t be able to focus on what I observe. Note to myself: I say “learn to breathe in it” and not “overcome it” or anything of the sort. First, because I think it cannot be overcame; second, because I don’t think I want to overcome it.)

I am writing poetry mostly, because I am sad, and poetry comes naturally to me in this state. Not good but quick poetry; I call it “poemas escritos a la ligera.” The word “ligera” carries with it the connotation of quick and light – at least to me. I am also making big efforts to write in Spanish. I had a long conversation with Laura and she suggested that I should concentrate in writing in one language; I think she’s right and after a brief deliberation with myself, I decided it should be Spanish. It is hard, because I am too used to thinking in English, but the outcome may be better because I do know Spanish far better than I know English.

Between the first entry in this journal and this second entry, I wrote very little. The main struggle with writing, so far, is time. I do too many things… But I have cut as much as I am willing to, so the time there is is the time there is. I figure that I feel unproductive because I am partitioning time in weeks; this doesn’t work for me. A week is too small of a period. So I will partition time in 2-week periods, stating goals in those terms may help me with a sensation of achievement.

The goal then is to write one poem and one short text (as exercises) every two weeks, give or take (I am a mathematician and mathematics is all about approximation. Also, I want to produce at least one entry in this journal, during each time period.

Sometime early this week I felt the need to stop reading narratives or essays – which is what I was reading. I felt it was taking away my mind from my writing ideas. I kept reading Safe Area Gorazde. Although this morning, as I was lying awake at 6am, I considered stop reading it as well. Not for the same reason though, but because of the nightmares I had last night and that kept haunting me as I lied in bed awaken by them. I decide to keep turning the pages, looking quickly at the images and rushing my eyes through the text, with the hope that at some point, the story will cease to be unbearable…

One more thing for this entry: order does not matter in the first burst of writing; order is for re-writing and editting. I need to have this as a mantra for the next few time periods... see if I get to make it into a habit.