The Dilemma

"There is no writing mood. If you can write when you're pissed off, then you can focus that energy and those emotions into your narrative. If you're elated, you can transfer those feelings to your audience. Writing is work, and you have to log in the hours. Sometimes it is painful, often it is rewarding."

My professor said it better, and Novakovick better than her, but the idea is still the same. A writer writes. It serves as their escape as well as their all-access pass; it's an extension of their voice, and as natural as breathing. Needless to say, I'm not there yet.

If I were to confess that blogging was my secret passion--something I got near orgasmic emotions from--than one glance by any casual wanderer into my camp would be enough to disprove me. And yet, like the tantalizing whisper of a lover, it calls me back, igniting hope that similar feelings will commemorate the next encounter. It is these thoughts that have haunted me for weeks now; and like a temptation, have pushed me to be good to my cause and my craft, knowing that in time they'll be good to me.

There may be no mood for writing, as every emotion powers the machine and feeds the behemoth, but can the same be said for other less abstract uses of our time? How about school, or work, or church? Writing has no mood, because writing has no excuse. If you want to be good, you write and write and write. And I guess in that sense, our various moods can't hold much sway over the other things. At least, that's what I've learned the past few weeks.

Before school started I scoured Logan like a phantom, haunting Main Street establishments with my eternal question: "Are you hiring?" Day after day I woke up with mission clear, and night after night I went to bed with mission failed. No one was hiring. How easy it would have been to stay in--all summer long I had slept in, gone to the gym, and watched 24. It was all I was in the mood for now. Any yet, I wanted a job. I needed one. And that desire erased my mood from the equation. There was no mood for finding a job, no ideal inspiration that I had to wait for before I was going to do it; it just had to get done.

The same can be said for school or church. I mean, the novelty wears off pretty quick once you hand in your first assignment, and it can certainly be hard sometimes to will yourself to Sunday school if you're feeling like you've just spent the last two years there. But after this Summer from Hell, I try and look at them as saviors in their own ways. The question is, what kind of student will I be? What kind of disciple? After Chamber Choir auditions yesterday, I realized that everything from the job hunt, to the homework, to the auditioning and even to the dating scene (or lack thereof) begged an answer to one over-arcing question. What are you made of?

I almost chuckled to myself as once again I returned to the theme of my search for self-improvement, and for this petty blog. In life's crux, where decisions must be made, this new inquiry carries an important relevance. What am I made of? Truly, that is the question.

Of course the argument can be made that I'm thinking too much about this; that I should just let life be lived. And I will. How else can I do it? But while this blog is not evidence that I spend all my time thinking of things I can or can't control, it can serve as evidence that at least I'm thinking at all. And each of these prisms of choice, light, and learning can be an opportunity to prove something. That I'm the master of my fate and the captain of my soul. And that I'm made of greater stuff than they think.