Metawriting

The first sign a writer is hard up for a topic to write about is the writer begins to write about the craft of writing.. Unless the reader happens to be a writer or aspiring writer, deep rooted boredom will set in. There is no reason to read something on a topic that has nothing to do with your life when there are Maxim’s and Glamour’s to be read.

When a writer writes about writing, it is called ‘metawriting’. The most annoying thing about metawriting is the self-referential statements like “this sentence contains the word ‘self-referential.’” All of this, while a bitter disappointment to a reader who wants to read something with wit and verve, is a necessity to the writer with writer’s block.

In each writer is the hope that as long as the quill is moving and the ink is flowing, the block that is preventing a masterpiece of literature from being crafted will crumble. That rarely happens.

Lately, as I struggle with my own craft, I’ve been seeking out places willing to pay money for my work. There is always a demand for writing. Every catalogue, website, or encyclopedia needs a writer [note to self: develop a character who is a writer who writes for an encyclopedia on writing]. In this fruitless search, I’ve come across one publication that wanted a writer to ghost write articles on finance as if the articles were written by a dog.

I’m not making this up. Such a premise is rather stupid to be a conceit to further this tale regarding writing. The ad that was asking for these bits of written work didn’t indicate the publication that would be using these works. I was left wondering if it was a magazine for people who loved dogs or a magazine for those people interested in finance. In either case, I can’t see where a dog would be a sound investment advisor. I could see it if a dog had once made a fortune on a stock market or scrimped and saved over time to buy a house of his own, but really, do dogs even know what money is?

I don’t even think we regard dogs as inherently good at economy. Ants understand the need to save, or at least the parable of the ant and the grasshoppers leads us to conclude they are. Squirrels know about stockpiling, but the truth of squirrels is they don’t remember the location of the stuff they stockpile and in the winter different squirrels randomly find the stockpiles. So a squirrel that is saving isn’t necessarily protecting his future, but the future of other squirrels.

Dogs bury bones, I guess. If I were to write such an article, I think I would do a pun thing based off of bones and bonuses. You know, when you get a bone/bonus, don’t eat it/spend it all, instead bury/save part of it for later. It wouldn’t be a very good article, but honestly, if you’ve taken the time to actually read those personal finance advice columns that is about the level of intelligence they offer.

The odd thing is, as a writer, I find the concept of writing about a dog’s perspective of finance to be kind of interesting. As you can probably tell, I’ve already given it some amount of thought.

Before the original point is completely lost, the idea is writers write about writing as an excuse to not write about stupid things like a dog’s perspective of finance. A writer knows that once he steps onto that path, selling his skill to craft something like this there is no turning back. If Michelangelo had painted signs for vendors at the market instead of works of art, he wouldn’t have ever been known. As I mentioned earlier, there is no shortage of need for writers. There is always a need for another list of the 5 Reasons Why Men Leave the Toilet Sit Up or 16 Ways to Spruce Up Window Bunting.

When you aspire to be a Hemingway or even a Piers Anthony, you can’t if you take that path, that path of selling your skills to craft things that will be thrown out in a month for a newer version of the same thing you had written. When you aspire to write a masterpiece, you are aspiring to immortalize your craft. Every writer wants to write that one piece of literature, one couplet of poetry that others will memorize, keep in their hearts, and repeat hundreds of times in their lifetime.

There is nothing wrong with the writer who does take the path of writing unremarkable things. That writer will have a career and a steady paycheck. The world only has so much room for Steinbeck’s and Grisham’s. There can only be one Tom Clancy and everyone else is a pretender. When a writer writes about writing, you have to forgive him. He is only trying to stay away from that path of writing those things that may be a path to a steady paycheck, but won’t inspire a reader any longer than it takes the reader to flip the page to the next list of things that will make the reader’s life so fantastic that the reader will no longer have a need to buy the magazine that gives out all the advice.

Sometimes, the writer may actually even writer something profound enough about writing that even the most disinterested reader will perk up and take notice. Maybe there is some advice, some element of reasoning in the writer’s opinions regarding writing that might apply to other aspects of the reader’s life. That would be the sign of a skilled writer, though and would be remarkably rare. More likely there wouldn’t be much in the piece that applied to anyone but that particular writer. Such is the nature of the business though. Universal lessons just aren’t that easy to develop, and sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.

Play

“The trouble with the world today is people don’t play like they used to,” the grizzled old man said to me as we waited for our separate lunch orders at the small deli up the street from me.

“How do you mean?” I asked, expecting a rant against television, videogames, and all that rot that is normally ranted against by someone who think having fun should involve hours of back breaking labor.

“I grew up in southern Illinois, a small rural town and we knew how to play as kids. We’d play hide and go seek until nightfall all throughout the summer. Or baseball when I was older. My friends and I would also go off to the river. We’d swim, eat sandwiches, goof off a lot.”

I nodded. I had a similar childhood. My summers were spent at home on Canyon Ferry Lake in Helena, Montana. I recall playing yard games with the neighbor’s grandchildren. We’d play tag, Red Light, Green Light, Simon Says, and all sorts of other games. We’d do it well past nightfall. Summer also meant fires on the beach roasting marshmallows. The fires weren’t casual things. We’d get down there early in the day, cutting willows for roasting skewers, gathering wood, setting up the fire ring and arranging the seating.

The fire was always large, or seemed large to me in my youth. Roasting marshmallows was a dangerous thing – for the marshmallow as it would most likely burst into flame. With a marshmallow fully alit, I would run down to the lake to douse it. I really can’t give a good explanation as to why I would do such things, I just did.

Around the fire would be family and friends. There always seemed to be a cousin around. That was one of the signs of summer for me. Living on the lake, all the family would come to our house to enjoy summer weekends. The lake itself offered countless hours of entertainment, whether it was swimming, boating, skiing or just floating on an inner tube.

The grizzled old man compared his childhood with his grandkids. “My son has to take them to scheduled baseball games. What is wrong with a pick-up game? If the kids have a moment of unscheduled activity, they are bored stiff. It isn’t that they want to watch TV, they don’t. But they don’t know what to do with unorganized time.”

I understood his point and understood what he was saying about knowing how to play. It isn’t the type of activity that is bothersome. It is about being self-sufficient enough to entertain yourself. While I came from a large family, I was the youngest, so as I grew up, my brothers and sisters left home. My summers in my adolescence were lonely. While everyone else I went to school with were in town going to parties, forming nascent romances, I was still at the lake. The neighbor’s grand kids were older than me and didn’t care to play those childish games like they once did.

I kept myself occupied though. I dove into reading books and keeping in contact with a few friends from school as best I could.

I learned how to entertain myself. I learned about the essence of imagination. What I missed in socialization, I more than made up in developing daydreams and fantasies. I am not going to lie and say I was never bored, but it was rare. There was always someplace I could walk to. Walk the mile to Jo Bonner Park at the base of Magpie Bay, or walk two miles over to Kim’s Marina and Riley’s Bar to play video games. Sometimes I’d just walk up Magpie Gulch to see how far I could get before tiring out. To me it was pure exploration.

The old man got his order and said bye to me. I watched him and wondered if he still played. I could see him enjoying a game of checkers or chess. He seemed to be the type that would spontaneously throw a few sodas in a bag with a peanut butter sandwich and drive a few hours to see the World’s Largest Ball of Earwax or some other bizarreness, just because.

I often lament what my childhood could have been. I could have been one of those city kids with lots of friends around all the time. If that had happened though, how would I have turned out? I know a lot of people now who always have to be doing something. They feel out of sorts with unorganized time. I revel in it. They say they are bored, I say I am set free. Two hours where I am not required to do anything or think about any particular thing is two hours I can slip into my fantasy world: a world that calls out to be explored.

When I was on my own in Chicago for the first time, I didn’t have anything. I lived in a tiny studio apartment, with no furniture, no TV, only the radio for entertainment. I had countless hours of free time and I explored. There was always someplace to walk to, always somewhere to go to see something new. Living without a car, without friends nearby, with only myself for company, I was able to draw upon the lessons of my childhood and the lessons of learning how to play.

Play teaches out how to interact with other people. That is probably the most important part of playing. We learn to share, we learn to compromise, and we learn how to lose and win gracefully. These are the things coaches of team sports stress. What is forgotten, the hidden lesson of learning to play, is learning how to keep yourself entertained. The game you play isn’t important. It is just a vehicle for the imagination. Take two people of the same culture, strand them together with a few small stones, cups, and knick-knacks and if they grew up knowing how to play, they won’t be bored. Those trinkets will be transformed magically into a new game. Or the area in which they are stranded will be thoroughly investigated and explored.

I know how to play. I enjoy playing. From board games and yard games to video games and role-playing games, there is never a reason to be bored. In college, my friends and I would sometimes be lounging, hanging out wondering what we should do. It wouldn’t take long before at the very least, we’d go on a quest of some sort. To those who know how to play, unorganized time is a secret blessing.

The Ugly One

Looking in the mirror was never difficult for me. In fact, I was fascinated with my face. I would stare at myself for hours in the window during dinner. My family at first I saw something outside in the darkness, but when they discovered I was looking at myself like some psychotic bird that doesn’t realize the thing staring back is itself, I no longer could sit on that side of the table. I now realize that I was staring in the same way a person stares at a circus freak.

As a child I just looked odd. As an adult, I’m homely. Bulbous nose, splotchy pale skin, occasional acne, and hair that refuses to be styled any differently than it was when I was five make up the core of my features. My eyes are a muddled mix of green and hazel and I stand at a mediocre 5’10” or so, tall enough to be tallish, but not tall enough that my height becomes an admirable trait. Just average enough that my lack of attractiveness is at eye level with the rest of the world.

I used to think that my hair was a stand out trait that people would look at and say “Wow, what beautiful hair.” It is red, soft, thick and I’ll have it until I’m ninety. Sadly, hair isn’t a pro trait, only an anti trait. What I mean by that is hair is used to remove someone from consideration but someone doesn’t come into consideration because of hair quality. So the fact I have nice hair doesn’t mean much. Also, it isn’t dark enough to be considered a strong punctuation mark on my image. It is a fading red, slowly turning blondish which with my pale skin makes me look like I am fading out of existence.

I also lack a muscular physique. That would at least be another element like height that I could use to overcome my dismal visage. People would say, “he may be ugly, but he is strong and muscular.” Though it wouldn’t mesh well with my personality. That is the other issue at hand, personality. A person with a great personality often is able to overcome physical shortcomings. A strong wit, charm, extroverted ways can go a long way. I don’t have any of that. I’m a shy person by nature. I am not funny, I don’t tell jokes or anecdotes, and the most charming thing I can say to another person is “I like your [article of clothing].” I don’t even use people’s names while talking, though that is a big charm ‘no-no’ because people love to hear their names spoken. Anytime I try it, it feels phony. Why do I have to keep saying a person’s name in a conversation? Are they suddenly going to forget that I am addressing my remarks to them? I may be boring but I think a person that I am in a conversation with wouldn’t forget such a thing.

I can’t make people laugh. I am less than handsome. I don’t have any interesting personal traits that help overcome my lack of comeliness. What I have is a good heart, soft shoulder, and good intellect. My everyday interests also force me away from normal society. I like movies, but not enough to be a walking Internet Movie Data Base of information. I like music, barely. I don’t enjoy most concerts because I hate standing for hours in the midst of people. I play video games but I rarely finish them and I don’t obsess over my computer system, spending tons of money in order to be able to play the newest games. I can discuss politics and philosophy, but usually my interests in those topics are on a level most people don’t think about. I often believe I am a renaissance man when it comes to knowledge – knowing a lot about many different things. Yet, it is all so esoteric that it doesn’t matter to most people. I can’t tell you who won last nights sporting match-up, who will be in the playoffs, who will be the most valuable player, or any of the stuff that normal people care about.

All this means is my conversation skills are just as bad as my physical attractiveness. I’m more comfortable in the world of ideas when most people just want to talk about what has happened in their day. I rarely talk about what happens in my day because, well, I hate my days. Yes, I do realize that could be why I am a bad conversationalist – I don’t have enough passion about anything to talk about it. Sadly, the things I do have a passion about, I feel most people just don’t care. Honestly, take this piece of writing, does anyone really care that I am ugly? Will this spur others to examine the aesthetics of humanity? Doubtful. Yet, I have a passion about my overall attractiveness.

Maybe a tattoo would spruce up my outer beauty? Shave the beard or keep it? What if I wore contact lenses that turned my eyes blue? How white should I make my teeth? Should I tan? What if I did a spray on tan instead of the harmful UV light tanning? How much change should I go through in order to become attractive? Does God really make unattractive people? We look at many different trees and note which ones we think are beautiful and which ones we don’t but all of them are miracles. All of them are something beyond our scope of accomplishing. Am I not as worthy as all the trees in the world to be considered a miracle? And aren’t miracles by the nature of being a miracle beautiful?

Who am I kidding? Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and society shares the same sets of eyes. I am unattractive. I can accept that. I shall serve as a contrast. I may not be attractive but people will be known as being attractive in comparison to me. Perhaps that is the miracle that was planned. How can we be sure if someone is truly attractive unless we can compare him to someone who isn’t attractive? Light and dark, wet and dry, we are known by our opposition.