Change Is In The Air

Something has changed in my life. Over the past several days, something has happened. What it is, I can't tell you. I have no idea. But something's changed. It's as if I've been living the past year in a haze and, suddenly, things are clear again.
Especially after coming back from New Orleans, I've really felt like I was purposeless. Or, not that I was purposeless, exactly, but that my purpose was in New Orleans. I wasn't ready to leave, not even close. And it's been really hard for me to let go and move on. Really, really hard. But something happened, and I finally have peace about coming back to little ol' Albany. That's not to say I wouldn't jump at a chance to go back to New Orleans. I still don't feel like I'm done there. I probably won't feel that way until the entire city is rebuilt. But I'm okay, for now, with letting someone else help out.
And, on top of the fact that I'm finally writing again, I've decided to stop trying to be rational and just go with what feels right.

I'm going to be a Creative Writing major. I've stopped telling myself that it could end up being a wasted effort if I don't make it big. I've stopped worrying about whether or not I'm 'good enough' to make it.
Or, at least, I've tried. That's a little longer in coming. Inadequacy has always been, and most likely always will be, one of my biggest fears in life. But I'm working on it.

James talked tonight about a man who loved to run. I thought it was kind of a funny story, at first. The man said that he understood God best when he was running. I didn't get it for awhile.
But then it hit me. That's me, when I'm writing.

It doesn't matter what I'm writing. I could be writing about my totally sucky day, and I still know that when I'm writing is when I feel the closest to God, because when I'm writing, I feel right. I understand myself, I understand my life, when I write. When I write, I feel like I have a purpose. Writing is just...who I am. In written words is where I am the most expressive, and creative, and real. It's where I am the most alive.
And it probably sounds ridiculous to anyone who doesn't feel the same way about writing as I do. But that's the best way I know how to explain it.

Courting Your Characters

When writing, I've come to realize that it's incredibly important to get to know your characters - your main character especially. I'd even go so far as to say that it's probably the single most important aspect of writing any story. The rest is what editors are for, really.
It's almost funny, really, because your characters are people you've created - assuming you're writing fiction. And so it just seems like you would automatically know all the little intimate details about each one. But it's really not like that at all. You have to take the time to get to know them. Once you've thought them up, it's your job to let them grow and develop. If you don't, you end up with empty, lifeless characters. And nobody wants to read that.
It's a strange feeling, really. You decide who lives and who dies. I've heard interviews with writers who've said that they were sobbing as they killed off a certain character in a book. I think that's how close you need to be with your characters in order to create a great story.

Courting your characters.
Yeah, it's that important.

I'm Writing Again.

Not just blog writing, or journal writing...

I'm really writing. Novel writing. And after a dry spell of a couple years, it's fantastic to be back at it. I love the spontaneity of it. I don't know how it is for other people, but writing for me isn't just sitting down and forcing something out. It has to come to me. So, lately, I've been in the middle of class or driving down the road, and I have to stop everything I'm doing or pull over so I can find a pen and a piece of scratch paper or tissue or something to write on.

Sometimes it makes me feel crazy. It's like an obsession. The smallest little things - leaves being scattered by the wind, or a look in someone's eye - will trigger a string of words that fit together so perfectly that I have to write them that very moment, just so I don't lose them. And then people ask me what I'm doing, probably because I look a little off my rocker. Not that I really take notice of the fact that they're talking to me until I've scrawled out whatever was swirling around in my head...

I live for this.

Then Again,

Maybe not.

I didn't write last night. But, then again, last night just sucked. So I wasn't in a blogging mood.
Sorry.

So, I'm feeling a little...oh, I don't know...uncomfortable, I suppose. I think my faith is becoming something more...hmmm...more real to me. And it sort of sounds ridiculous to hear myself say it, because I've been through some crap and I know there have been times when I've really, truly turned to God to give something to him because I just couldn't handle it anymore. So to say that my faith wasn't real before is difficult. So I'm not sure if that's entirely true.
It's hard to explain. I suppose I just believed in God the way a little kid believes in God. I simply believed. And I never, never questioned it. I never even thought of questioning it, of questioning what I believed.
But, gradually, it's like something's been changing in my mind. I find myself thinking more about the concept of God. I mean, really thinking. And it makes me really uncomfortable. Because, on one hand, I know that I do believe it. I really do. The very thought of life without God is just unreal to me. It's hardly life at all. But, on the other, the whole thing just seems so ludicrous. So it makes me feel kind of crazy. I mean, really. I believe in some invisible guy who spoke the world into being and whose son rose himself from the dead.
Logically, it just doesn't make sense. And, while I've never prided myself on being especially logical (far from it, actually), I do like for things to make at least a little sense.
When I think of God and when I think of things like heaven and hell and angels and demons, I feel uneasy. It's just so big. It's a lot to wrap my head around. It's a lot to believe. It's staggering, almost.
I try not to think about it, sometimes.
My biggest problem, I think, is that I have serious issues with relinquishing control. And it took me a long time to realize that, because most other people don't realize it either, so nobody's ever called me a control freak or anything like that. Since I'm such a passive person, I always just assumed that that meant that I had no problem with letting someone else be in control.
But I've learned that having no problem following someone else's directions and giving someone else complete control are two radically different things. And I really, really do not enjoy giving someone else control. I don't even like talking about problems I have, just daily things, because I feel like, by admitting that something is wrong, I'm allowing someone else to step in and fix it - and to take control of the situation. (Poor Evan could tell you all about that. He always has to pry everything out of me.)
And so, if I'm willing to admit to myself - I mean, fully accept and acknowledge - that God really is God and it all is really real, then I have to surrender control to him. Complete control of my life. And that terrifies me.
So, to wrap it all up, I'll just say this:
I am, intentionally or not, almost always in a power struggle with God. It's infuriating at some times, and humbling at others. I am also in a constant power struggle with myself - the contolling part of me against the part that wants to let it go. And thinking about God too seriously is uncomfortable for me.

But maybe the reality of God is that he's supposed to be uncomfortable sometimes.

Maybe I'm Starting A New Routine:

Late-night blogging.

I'm not going to bother with starting every post off with "I don't really have anything to say", because it would appear that I usually think of something as I go. So I do have something to say. I just don't know what.

I actually wasn't sure if I wanted to write tonight (maybe because I don't know what to say...), but Evan told me I should, because the more I write, the better I get. I suppose I can't argue with that...

Late-night blogging.

It makes me think of some love-struck, hopeless romantic with a cup of hot coffee, sitting in bed with their notebook on their lap, typing away.

I don't know if I fit into any of those categories.

...Maybe the first two. And maybe the last. So half, then.

Late-night blogging.

The beginning of a story, perhaps?

...No. Never mind. Too cliché. The opening of a cheesy romance movie, maybe.
And I'm fairly certain I just spent ten minutes trying to find the key code for that stupid e at the end of cliché. I think the accent might be backward, but I'm not looking anymore.

Okay, I really don't have anything tonight. Anything that I happen to mention is going to seem totally random and out of nowhere.

I hate writing like that.
So I'm going to bed.
Actually, I'm going to go read Tess.
Maybe I'll talk about that tomorrow night.

Sorry, to all of you who actually thought there would be something interesting tonight.
That was false advertising on my part.

Sue.

Welcome Back.

Funny, it's been almost a year since my last post.

And I don't really have anything important to say, just to save you the time searching, but it's almost midnight on Sunday night and I'm sitting here, listening to "Last Christmas", by Wham!, and have nothing better to do. So I'm writing.


I was a little disappointed in myself, I have to admit, when I read the little caption below my blog title that I'm sure I once thought was witty and realized that I used the word "smally". I keep telling myself it must have been a typo. I just can't figure out what I really meant.


...Probably smally.


I'm eager to be done with high school. I feel like I need a new start. Although, I suppose, if I really wanted a new start, I shouldn't have taken classes at LBCC this year. Because now I'm just used to it. And I've realized that it sucks just about as much as high school. The only upside is that you don't have to do your homework to get a good grade. I'm a fan of that. I'm a little disappointed that the classes aren't any harder, though. Actually, I'd argue that they're easier. After four years of advanced, college-prep classes at South, my classes at LB are a little anticlimatic. For example: I took my first mid-term last week. History of Western Civilization. Fifty questions. I finished in ten minutes. It was probably the easiest thing I've ever done in my life.

I bet the whole college thing would be more enjoyable, though, if I actually knew what I wanted to do with my life. "Oh, Chelsea," they say, "most people your age don't know what they want to do with their lives." Most people have an idea, though. If I even had an idea, that would be convenient.

I have no idea. Not one.

Actually, that's not entirely true. I know what I wanted to be, until last year. I wanted to be a teacher. Since probably third grade, I've wanted to be a teacher. But I changed my mind last year. I'm too much of a pushover. And, by the time I'd be old enough to be a teacher, class sizes will be about fifty, and I just don't want to deal with that every day.

And I've wanted to write since I could form words, basically. But the only semi-steady writing out there is journalism. And I really am just not feeling that. I want to write a novel. Several novels. But that's kind of a hit-or-miss career choice. It's the artsy, nerdy version of those boys who say they want to play for the NFL. I either get lucky and write a winner like Miss Rowling did, or I end up a "struggling artist" forever. No, thanks.

I saw a quote once that said "There is no greater agony than bearing an unwritten story inside you."

It's pretty much the most truthful thing I've ever seen. Too bad getting the story out is a lot easier said than done, hmm?


What I think I'd really love, though, would make me no money at all. And by "no money at all", I don't mean that I simply wouldn't get to live a life of luxury. I mean that I would put way more money into it than I would ever, ever get out of it, because I would not get any money out of it. So, unless God decides it's a super idea and hands me a winning lottery ticket, that's out of the question.

Bummer.