What I Write when I’m Not in the Mood

Writing’s not a lonely pursuit, because that’s something quite different, but it is an interest that’s best pursued when one is alone.

I’m alone right now.
Not lonely.
And the house is not quiet.
It is filled with my noises.

I like loud music. Not music that’s meant to be played loudly, but music that’s meant to be played softly played loudly. There’s a difference. And it’s not that I can’t hear it if it’s played softly, I just find that it’s more effective when it’s loud. It fills the room better. It fills my mind better.

That said …

There’s still enough space in my mind for writing to wend its way out of my mind onto the page.

I know someone who belittles people with her mocking tone. She denigrates their feelings and pounds them (both the feelings and the sense-of-self of the person) into dust. It’s not who you might think it is. I’ll not tell you who it is because people are sensitive. Besides, I have no evidence of this other than the fallout I’ve observed. Fallout is not always indicative of the nature of an explosion. The wind blows too.

I just took a break (to take a picture of a mat (and to sit at the top of the stairs learning Hindi)). When I came back, I re-read what I’d written (see above) and my first impulse was to delete it. Because, from your point of view, it’s absolute garbage. But I’m not going to delete it though because that’s where writer’s block starts: with the thought that you’re writing things for other people when you’re not. I’m writing this for me. Everything I’ve written so far makes perfect sense to me.

Let me explain:

Here’s the picture I took of part of one of the mats in the bathroom:

It’s while standing on this mat that I do most of my best thinking. This is where I stand when I brush my teeth in the morning. It’s here where I thought of the person who belittles people and …

Then I sigh, look out the window at all the things I should be doing instead of this and I … I despair. I don’t want to do those things but still, they must be done. How can I live my life in the midst of things that are old and breaking down? How can I sleep on a pillow that stinks of old heads? How can I see the pond and not want to fix the hole in the liner halfway down that constantly drains half of the water out into the surrounding ground. I want to fix but then again I don’t. I want things to be pretty and in good working order, but I also want to live an easy life without responsibility. I want to sit around and do the things that I want to do instead of the things that call my attention. Fix me, fix me because I can’t fix myself.

I don’t like things that can’t fix themselves. I want to go out and put all the plants in plant pots in the ground. I want to say no to people who ask me to get things from the top of cupboards because there are things such as ladders that make them enabled. Why should I enable disablement? Encourage everyone to learn how to do everything. Make us all experts so that we don’t have to have servants and slaves and ministerial persons.

But I digress.

It bothers me that the photograph of the mat has the shadow of my arm in the bottom right-hand corner. It bothers me that I have to say the mat instead of my mat. It bothers me that there are some things that I can’t do (or don’t want to do) unless I am alone. It bothers me when I’m not alone.

I get ideas when I watch movies and read books.

As an aside (but isn’t all of this an aside?) I’d be interested in what my mind would be like without those external ideas. Or maybe I’d be bored. Interested or bored. Hmm. Yeah, definitely one of those two.

Last night’s idea, from a movie called Love Happens, was that I should work through my feelings about my parents dying, which they inevitably will do, before they die and then I’ll have that out of the way so that when they do die I can just carry on with my life as if nothing has happened. I wonder if this could ever work. Maybe a better approach would be to contact them every now and again, apart from just on their birthdays and at Christmas, so that I can build up a healthy relationship with them. But then again, if I wanted to do that then wouldn’t I have done it already? It crosses my mind that staying away from my parents is a way of preparing myself for their death. Yeah, I know: that sounds utterly selfish to me too. Perhaps they want something from me. But what?

I have no children. But if I did, what would I want from them? Would I want them to contact me when I was old or would I want them to demonstrate that they are perfectly adapted to the world into which I’d released them to the extent that they don’t need my help, advice or company? Would I be happy for them to be perfect strangers getting on with their own lives?

Probably the latter.

Being self-sufficient is important to me. The ability to do things without needing anyone’s help is an important attribute of a human being.

That said, I wonder if I should get a gardener.

Hey! I just realised. Is that one of the reasons people have children? Maybe I should call my mom and see if she needs help with the garden.

Then again, look at the state of this garden.

I wonder if it costs much to concrete a garden over and paint it green.

I should stop now.
I’m not in the mood.
Perhaps you can tell.