#Reverb10 - enough
Prompt: One Word. Encapsulate the year 2010 in one word. Explain why you're choosing that word. Now, imagine it's one year from today, what would you like the word to be that captures 2011 for you?
The word: Interesting
"May you live in interesting times" is allegedly an ancient Chinese curse. While little evidence of it actually being a curse is in evidence, it is an unusual expression and one that has come to mind more than once over the course of this past year.
In November of 2009, I completed my first National Novel Writing Month with a very personal, angsty and quite self-indulgent novel. I finished the story, hit the 50K word plateau and considered doing more with it. However, I ended up leaving it be which in hindsight was a good choice as it had all the makings of a good trunk novel. The unexpected fallout from writing such an intensely personal story was that my creative juices dried up.
It seemed to me that during NaNo last year that my creative flow was at such a high boil that when the story was completed, the goal reached and plans made and discarded, that after turning the boiler down a little, there wasn't anymore liquid to create with. I had filled 3 Moleskinne notebooks during 2009 with ideas, poems, short bits and just words. Something came to me at all hours of the day and night. I felt like I was constantly having ideas. Some good, some not so good, but ideas nonetheless.
Sometime in January of this year, it dried up. Empty pages mocked me. Oh, I could gin up a basic and breezy LiveJournal entry about goings on or something in the news/sports world that caught my attention. But writing anything beyond that was beyond me for many months.
The dam didn't burst so much as suffer from being chipped away, little by little, piece by piece. I figured that 'The Gift' wouldn't come back unless I went looking for it. That meant writing something each day, whether I felt like it or not. Quite often the not was quite loud and the like it was silent. I needed a nudge, something besides the prompts from places like Three Word Wednesday and Big Tent Poetry which weren't working for me as I had hoped. I wasn't happy with what I was writing.
I was directed to 750words.com sometime during the summer but hesitated to make that commitment. When I did, there really was no turning back for me. After a couple of false starts, I got on a good roll. 27 days and I was looking forward to continuing when Life got in the way in the form of an accident. No writing for close to a month, then semi-lucid blatherings, but I was writing. That's when it got interesting.
I didn't hear a click, or feel the light bulb go on, but there seemed to be a moment when writing everyday became important and needful, where filling a blank screen or piece of paper was a challenge and not something to dreaded. It was wonderful and freeing.
Another interesting event that happened was a reconnection with someone who I thought was lost to me, and that has me filled with hope for tomorrow. It should be interesting (there's that word again!) to see how things move forward.
One final rumination on interesting, and that's how I have become more fascinated and intrigued I am with my wife. She is endlessly interesting to me and I look forward to discovering more of her mysteries.
2011 one word: Growth
I would like to continue to grow, to move ahead and spend less time gazing backwards or at my navel in deep introspection. There really is a large world full of awesome and amazing wonders to behold and I would like to partake of more of that. Be a better husband, better employee, better man, better example, better everything when it comes down to it.
I have relationships I want to grow, nurture and see flourish. I want to be more considerate, more thoughtful and more responsive to the needs of others. I want to be a singer in a rock 'n roll band, but that ain't happening at this point in life, so letting those dreams go is part of growth.
I'd like to grow as a writer, be freer in myself to express myself and not be afraid of what I'll find hiding just under the surface. So, these are the words of reflection and manifestation for today.
Posted via LiveJournal app for iPhone.