Fearing engaging art...

For the best several months, I feel as though I've been once again bitten by the writing bug. I used to write quite a bit when I was younger. You know, I was that gawkish boy who really didn't fit into any particular clique and found himself typing away at his parent's ancient typewriter at home (this was obviously before we had a computer in the house!). I wrote all sorts of stuff, junk mostly. Actually, most of it was just fiction stuff, random thoughts from a random juvenile mind. There were stories of war, of course, as well as a way too long ramble that resembled a sick mix of Beverly Hills 90210 (an old TV show for you young kids!) and Dawson's Creek. I also wrote some very sub-par poetry and such as well. Even though, especially looking back, so much of what I wrote was garbage, I seemed to get some respect for what I'd done, getting sent to a few writing workshops by well meaning teachers and such. One of those teachers told me something I've yet to forget. Basically, she said, "Andy, you have a God-given gift for writing. It's now up to you to decide what to do with it." I was flattered, but maybe not as much as I should have been. We're cocky when we're young.

Well, years have passed and the writing sort of fell by the wayside. It's tough to have time to write when you're worrying about school, girls, girls, um, girls. Plus, I was just young and trying to figure out my place in the world. So, essentially the only things I've really written in, say, the past ten years, are emails, journal entries, and for the past several months, these things. I'm a little intimidated to get back into the whole swing of things as far as it goes and also realize that it will take a lot of discipline as well.

But perhaps the most daunting thing holding me back is a nagging question at the back of my mind: "Will anybody want to read this? Will it be worth anything to anyone?" My reading in Thomas Merton's book, The Sign of Jonas, didn't help much last night. He writes:

"We who say we love God: why are we not as anxious to be perfect in our art as we pretend we want to be in our service of God? If we do not try to be perfect in what we write, perhaps it is because we are not writing for God after all. In any case it is depressing that those who serve God and love Him sometimes write so badly, when those who do not believe in Him take pains to write so well. I am not talking about grammar and syntax, but about having something to say and saying it in sentences that are not half dead. Saint Paul and Saint Ignatius Martyr did not bother about grammar but they certainly knew how to write."

Maybe I'll look at writing in the New Year, as a sort of resolution...