Jesus and his lawyer are coming back

One of the things about writing that I could never get around was honesty. I’m just not an honest person. I have an almost unnatural fear of people judging me, and I knew that in writing, I would have to open myself up to that. Most importantly, I would have to write stories that were based on facts in my life, and I worried about how people would respond to those facts. Yesterday’s post was highly personal, and I thought about not posting it because I knew there would be explanation necessary. I was right.

I always thought writing would be great as long as it happened in a vacuum. And they (the nebulous group of writing people) always say write like no one is reading. How lucky for the people who can commit things to paper with personal amnesia. I wrote a short story once that was deeply personal. I wrote it one night in a sort of fevered expulsion. I wrote as if no one was reading. Then, someone read it. A writing teacher, in fact. And she liked it. She said it was moving and authentic and of professional quality. Instead of encouraging me that I could write, it just seemed to deflate me, because the assignment didn’t have my name and the teacher wasn’t judging me. I had only been brave enough to submit it under a ruse. I was am a coward.

I then thought if I write, I would write fantasy. That way, I could create my own universe and be as dishonest as I wanted. If I chose to write about my life, I could cloak everything in allegory and the Serpentine Cape of the 9th Paralanine Regiment. See, that seems like a fantasy type reference. Instead, when I signed up for school, I decided to skip the fiction, the screenwriting, and the poetry. I chose technical writing instead. It is a poor substitute for what I really wanted, which was to write haunting, personal fiction. I tell everyone that a technical writing degree is more practical, takes me further, earns me more money. I make it sound like my choice was guided by rationalism and capitalism. But then I’ve always had trouble with honesty.