|
Sipping
I thought I could organize freedom; how Scandinavian of me...
3-10
- About a week ago I finished reading Chuck Palahniuk's latest novel, Lullaby. Being a fan of his work, I've been wanting to read it ever since it came out last year. But for whatever reason I only just got around to it. Sometimes it's like that for me... I get a stack of things going that I want to read, and it becomes hard to find ways to bump the rotation around for just one title -- even if it is something I'm are really into. Plus, for whatever reason, I like buying paperback copies of novels. Hardcover books are more permanent, and have a certain romance to them, I know; but there's just something about having a title from your favorite author that you can bend, curl, and dog-ear.
-
- Eh.. maybe I'm weird.
-
- The thing is, though - it had been almost a year since I read my last Palahniuk book. 12 months of waiting for something new from one of my favorite authors. It's not like I expect Chuck to put something out every two weeks just to keep me happy, but it brought about this weird sort of expectation/anticipation thing that sometimes happens to me when I'm waiting for new stuff to come out.
-
- I waited for what seemed like ages to get my hands on this book.
But when it finally arrived, I finished it in less than three days.
-
- And even though I really liked the story and the characters, there was something kinda... disappointing in the feeling that came afterwards. Like I had read it too fast. Like I had been so excited for it to arrive that I didn't really take the time to savor the experience when it finally showed up.
-
- Now I'm waiting for his next novel.
-
- Waiting.
-
- Because of record label politics and re-mixing, Me'Shell Ndegeocello's last album came out almost a year late of it's originally scheduled release date. All total, three years went by between albums.
-
- It's been almost two years waiting for a new Mike Keneally album.
The last novel Jay MacInerney put out appeared on the shelves in late 2000.
And it's been what... close to five years hoping for something new from Portishead?
-
- It's not uncommon for this type of thing to happen to me. There are two bands who will be coming out with albums in the next couple of months that I'm really looking forward to - Hed PE and Nothingface. I think I'm really jazzed for these discs because I've gotten into these bands just recently. It's like I'm so into their work right now that the idea of even newer stuff from them appeals to me even more.
-
-
I'm like that with music. If I find something new that I enjoy, whatever it may be - I find myself doing whatever I can do dig into it, find out as much as I can about it, listen to as much of it as possible. It's even moreso the fact if the musician, artist, writer, or whatever is something that I connect to on some emotional level. Mike Keneally inspires me to play guitar. Palahniuk and MacInerney push me to write. They might not know it, but sometimes it's almost like I need new inspirations from my favorites when the batteries get low.
-
- Not that I can't survive or create without them, but that the times that they have been there for me have been so good, that it's hard not to want even more of that feeling, that competition, that inspiration.
-
- Of course, there are no shortage of vultures hanging around waiting to take advantage of this. Unreleased songs from Nirvana and Stevie Ray Vaughn, unfinished demo sessions by Jeff Buckley and Frank Zappa. Books of collected letters and correspondence from famous authors discussing how they spend their days between writing books. Remix collections. Tribute albums. Re-mastered classics re-released with new liner notes that discuss the merits of the "previously unreleased material that no true fan can live without!"
-
- And we fall for it. We go there. We line up.
-
- I mean, junkies don't run out and buy "Crack - the Peel Sessions."
They just go get more crack, you know?
-
- If there's ever a new Nine Inch Nails album, how long will it take me to listen to it? When the new Matrix films, the final installment of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, and (heaven help me).. the next horrid Star Wars prequel comes out.. how long will it take me to watch?
-
- Not that I won't find some way to buy the special extended collectors-edition DVD set and watch them a million times in a row after that fact, but how many times to you get to taste the first strawberry of the summer? How many times do you get to share a first kiss?
-
- It's been almost three months since I've updated this journal.
Three months since I've really written anything.
-
- More and more in the past year, there have just been periods - a few weeks here, a month there, whatever - where it just doesn't happen for me. Sometimes I'm busy. Sometimes my mind is socked up with other things. Sometimes, (even though I know that there are people who read and enjoy my work) it's hard not to see all that writing I've done, and how far it's not taken me in terms of being published, being celebrated, and being able to write for a living instead of trying to fit it in when I have a free moment...
-
- Sometimes it's hard for me not to wonder why I keep doing it.
-
-
- Just what is it that I'm trying to say?
And who is it that I'm trying to say it to?
-
- Were you waiting for me to update? We're you hoping to see something new when you checked the site?
-
-
- How long has it taken for you to read this far?
Regardless of how frustrating it is in my own private grander scheme of things, I still want to write. I still mess with my acoustic guitar almost every day, even though it seems like my chances of being the next Hendrix are perhaps fading with time...
But then again, it's not like I started playing guitar to become the next Hendrix in the first place. I started playing because I liked the way it sounded. I liked the way that the process of making music made me feel. I enjoy writing. I like expressing my opinion. Stories appear in my mind, and I want to get them out. It's not always about some ticket to fame, or some magic mushroom escape from the realities of rent payments, electric bills, or student loans.
Not that it wouldn't be nice, mind you.
It's about being who I am. It's about using my own voice to speak my own language.
I've fallen into a pattern lately where I drink three large cups of coffee every morning. The first one is for waking up, for answering my body's call for fresh caffeine. The first cup I don't even taste. The third cup is just sort of habit, just something to have while I'm working. The first one I gulp. The third one I sort of toy with.
The third cup I don't usually even finish.
- But that second cup... yeah -- that's the one.
The second cup of coffee is the one I savor. The one that lasts all the way from the driveway to the parking space at the office. If I don't have the first, I rarely have the third. If I don't have the first, the second doesn't taste good at all.
I don't really understand why it is. But maybe sometimes maybe it's okay not to know.
Thanks for reading this. If you like, come back by in a few days...
-
I'll do my best to have a second cup ready for you.
|