what is it with this stupid mystique of writers and writing? every writer i have met has been maladjusted in some way. a bag full of quirks, an idiosyncrasy that slaps you in the face five minutes after meeting them. a history of broken relationships. tenuous relationships with family. addiction.
i had a friend who wrote dialog that was funny without being sugary. dialog that crackled and was sharp. could never end a conversation with him, it would go on literally for hours moving from one topic to the next. then suddenly he would just turn around and walk away. no goodbye, no see ya later. just like that. when i brought it up, suggesting perhaps he had lost a pet at a young age, he claims he didn’t realize he even did it. he just figured there was a lull and he didn’t want to waste my time.
i had another friend, brilliant poet, excellent teacher, was told that he had a choice of either to stop drinking coffee or to stop drinking bourbon or else he would lose his eye. he gave up coffee because giving up bourbon would most likely result in him being arrested for assault. he also pointed out that when he taught in prison he often wondered if he had any business leaving it at the end of the day.
and we seem generally to be curmudgeons, in tune with some other part of the psyche that makes us keen observers but also disgusted by what we see. we don’t turn away though, we wallow in it, we roll around in it. as if we never had a choice, as if the possibility of having any other choice would be obscene. we were made or are we born?