by any other name

'so it begins,' so they say. it began so long ago but finds itself unsaid until this beginning. ...and end scene of pretentious back-talk. why now? why the irrelevant logging that will ultimately concentrate all my self-serving urges? i had a journal for four months, january to may my junior year of college. it topped out around 186 pages of single spaced, 10 point fonted recording. something like 11.5 pages per week for 16 weeks. now isn't that something. so why now. maybe it's the desperate need to spray words on this virtual page. maybe the loss of innocence that somehow went unnoticed or expressed for 20-odd years. maybe i just need to know i can let it all out. maybe it's the best way to compensate for sucking at chess, making up for being unlucky at both the cards and the other thing. doesn't matter. i just wanna. there's only one other style of writing, that i know of, comparable to mine. the meter, the rhyme. imagery, abstraction with the flair of a breezy summer kiss and the realism of one in winter. i was able to swim in that style for a time but, if not obvious by now kiddos, that pool's dried up. no room for questions, off to find a hose. we start casting soon. this weekend started off with a boom, finished the final draft of the script. and, quite frankly, i like hearing people remark on their enjoyment of my work. so it was a banner few hours before the generic nyquil kicked in and left me with the very temporary grin. the weekend has mostly been spent in the glow of frasier, friends, dougie howser, and the second season of the west wing. life is beautiful took up a share, along with coffees, breves, books. and a few too many bad dreams. almost four in the morning, typing and watching and waiting to go off to work. i'm setting up writing groups, forcing the hand of social intercourse past dry humping its way through the day. the first meeting is tuesday. casting is scheduled for saturday. throw in movies and books and the daily grind and a guy can hope to fill his seconds enough to keep from...thinking. daydreaming. pondering all the things that are lost, going over all the things that only look that way. all the things you didn't save, didn't try to save, didn't want to save. and all the thoughts you wished didn't need to be saved. it's sloppy, isn't it? flopping out the words and phrases and philosophies that tell nothing of my story but everything about how i want it told? it's sloppy and solipsistic. sloppy and slippery and it only reminds of all the things that only hurt to be remembered. 11.5 pages per week? guess it must have been a slow four months.