I Am Worried

An Ode To Writer's Block, Except It's Not Really An Ode

I am worried I don’t know how to write anymore.

Me posting this Substack from my bed.

It sounds ridiculous even now as I say it.

Type it.

Whatever.

But it feels true.

This throbbing in my skull tells me to get words out, out, out, and yet I cannot. Instead I circle the drain that is re-reading the scene I last wrote in hopes that it will somehow breathe new life into whatever is supposed to come next.

I re-worked the outline and started writing an entirely new book and did all of the exercises I would advise anyone else to do (okay, admittedly not all of them, but let me wax some poetic drama please) and yet the block lingers.

I am deep enough in this now to know that writer’s block is not real. The term was invented in 1947 by some Freudian white guy (probably white, I did not fact check but it was ‘47 and I certainly doubt he was a shade darker than that of skim milk) and has been used as an excuse to put the pen down ever since.

I cannot afford to put the pen down. The pen is all I have. The pen is all I am.

(Not true, but we’re being dramatic.)

It is all I think about, all I want to be doing, all I can focus on. And yet it dances just out of my reach. My greatest enemy, apparently.

That is, if we are not at present counting whatever demon embodies my cat at 4:30 in the morning. If we are counting the demon-cat then apologies, for she is in fact my greatest enemy. Sleep is a serious thing in this house and the demon-cat does not seem to care for such things as ‘circadian rhythm’, or general propriety, or manners that suggest if someone is soundly resting it may perhaps be quite rude to knock everything one can get one’s paws on off of the surfaces on which they reside. I will refrain now from listing the many items broken, lost, shattered beyond repair, disfigured, or otherwise maimed at the paws of said demon-cat because although she is incredibly guilty, I will—in the least surprising way possible—likely continue to let her get away with these night-time antics indefinitely.

The irony in all of this of course is that I am technically writing right now. But it is not Writing capital ‘W’. It is not the Manuscript capital ‘M’. I will not proofread this ad nauseam and I am quite certain half of it won’t make much sense. It is quite reasonable, in fact, to assume that I will wake up feeling embarrassed about the whole thing and archive this at minimum. Even more likely? That I delete it entirely after facing the hopeful reality which tends to accompany a good night’s sleep.

So, does it count as Writing if it is not the Manuscript?

Logically, yes.

In the deepest bowels of my soul, no.

Probably not a good enough reason to use the word bowels, but here we are.

I fear being inadequate. I fear I am forever destined to fail. I fear I am not the person who gets what they want in this life, but rather has been destined to sit just outside of the zone of possibility, reaching ceaselessly towards a future I can no better grasp than the dream I had last night. It lingers there, like the dream, little more than a feeling in my chest. A notion of a story on the tip of my tongue that I just can’t seem to articulate. An understanding that it exists somewhere within, but for whatever reason absolutely refuses to pony up and make itself known.

Is it the short form content on [REDACTED] I so needlessly consume?

Is it the endless pining for something else? Something other?

Is it a simple bout of boredom I need only push through to find revelations galore waiting for me beyond the illusory horizon line of my own inadequacy?

I’ve read so few books in the last three months, maybe that’s the problem (in saying it now, I’m almost certain that’s the problem). Maybe what I need is to wake and stretch and read, and read, and read until my stomach churns with want and hunger and I am forced from the safe ship of my bed and into the kitchen where I round up libations of coffee and scavenge for sustenance (what an annoying sentence this has become) before collapsing back into a rotting pile of need for the page.

My stomach hurts. And I am tired. And I have not written anything of note in what feels like a millennium.

And I will wake tomorrow.

And I will try again.

Hopefully with less of a flair for the dramatic, but I highly doubt that.

Regardless, I will try again, no matter how begrudgingly.

I must.