Friday, July 9, 2010

Oddly Instructive...

I had a dream last night that I was in a garden with some of my girl friends. We all sat around a table eating little somethings and drinking punch. At one point we all gathered around one of the girls as she held up a copy of her newly published novel next to a copy of her first. We were all a-twitter, and I, of course, was completely awestruck. "How do you do it?" I asked during a momentary lull in conversation. I--with my hundreds of unfinished pages and useless manuscripts--I needed to know. She leaned back, resting her hands sagely on her pregnant belly, and said, "In order to be a good writer, you have to write about what you know. Research. Research. Research."

And then my phone rang and I woke up. But I woke up oddly invigorated...like I had this renewed desire to experience EVERYTHING.

Thursday, July 8, 2010

Cusp


-noun
7. a point that marks the beginning of a change.


For the next seventeen minutes, it's still morning. I can take the time to write.

I am standing on the brink with my arms spread and my eyes wide open. And I'm tipping forward, but not falling. Not yet. I don't feel strange; I don't feel scared. I feel...nothing. Because "nothing" is what I am. I am practically a wife, but I'm not. I'm not in my old apartment, but I am. I am almost so many things that I am not. I don't know how to be these days. I don't know what role to play, or which me to be. Am I uncomfortable? A little bit. But it is only the natural discomfort that comes from being stuck in a liminal space. I am liminal.

That was the catchword in the English Department for many years: Every work of literature was all about "liminality," and I grew to dislike the word. But I find now that it is all I've got. Knowing about it is the only thing that keeps me sane, because liminality--or limbo--by my definition, is not a destination. Thank goodness. It's a passage.

There are lots of things I want to write about these days, but I find that most of them are actually probably too personal. There are things I want to--I need to--say and do. But I cannot. I'm still liminal. I'm still pending. I am in the throes of these desperate last few days before the dam breaks. Before the floodgates opens. Before I begin the last GREAT adventure of the rest of my life. There will be other great adventures. Of course. But I have a feeling they will all be tied inextricably to this one.

It is an immense feeling to love and to be loved.

Transition

Nobody blogs anymore, and nobody reads blogs anymore, so I suppose here is as good a place as any to empty the contents of my bruised heart....