After a week or two of saving up every little thing to add to the blog once the Installments were over and after being so anxious to post every little thing aside from the Installments, I find that the universe, in essence, is saying No Thanks. A few reasons why I believe the universe is placing me on hold (temporarily?) for now:
Reason #1: I have sent out eleven very important emails to either dear friends or colleagues. Not one of them has replied. Let me repeat. Not one. It has been over a week.
Reason #2: I reduced my overbearing book collection by 320 books. Yes, it was painful to pack them up and say goodbye, but it had to be done. Must make space for all the new ones. I took my castaways to the local used bookstore to see if they would like to purchase some for credit or cash. Out of 320 books, Mr. Bookseller decided that exactly FIVE of my books were worthy. While I can appreciate the need to pick books that will be "sellers" and that will return a "profit" I must point out that I don't read schlock. I had (and now, of course, still have) some excellent hard cover, first editions in there. Literary fiction. Five books for 10 dollars. And it took him an hour and half to sort through them all and tell me that. Let me repeat. Five books. 10 dollars. Perhaps you are beginning to see the "Thanks, but No Thanks" vibe the universe seems to be sending my way.
Reason #3: The number of short stories submitted to various journals in the past few months: nine. The number of rejections from various journals without a single comment or even the form rejection letter -- just returned as if not even opened except to just turn around and mail it back: nine. I won't repeat it. It's too painful.
Reason #4: Since I've waited so long to post this, my fourth reason is now less germane to my story. It is about my blog. For reasons that can only be attributed to Ed's link to my last DFW Installment, traffic to my blog reached a shocking all-time high. Thursday and Friday logged record visitors. And yet. Not a single comment. Not on Thursday. Not on Friday. Almost not even on Saturday. And then a few trickled in. This whole #4 carries much less weight now of course. It would have been much more powerful ON Saturday, BEFORE the comments. Had I offended? Was it the Oprah thing? Had I underestimated the Oprah tolerance among my readers? Was it the Frey inference? The obvious irritation with MFA+Phd that I don't possess? Admitting to a lost and then possibly refound crush for DFW? Such a discrepancy in the traffic to comment ratio can be excruciating. And, as you can guess I might say by now, smacks of a certain "So take that" attitude from the world beyond.
Reason #5: Even Ed's mention of my site went, and still remains, commentless. How could so many people have clicked through and then clicked all over my own blog, yet...no comments. Bizarre. Or? The universe saying it's sick of my drivel and could I just be quiet for awhile?
I will say this. Clearly I will not be quiet. I don't possess those genes. I will also say that so much worrying about what others think (of your writing, of your emails, of your discarded books) is not productive and frankly, is quite sad. Yet while enduring this special wall of silence the universe has constructed for me, I have found that the wondering is powerful. The "What have I done?" factor coupled with the "Maybe my email and blog comments just aren't working" checking (and re-checking!) left me feeling blank. Stunted. Cut out of a conversation I began. I began to feel an isolation, a cut-off-ness, that I rarely get to experience in daily life (short of escaping to the mountains.)
The results are delicious.
After resigning myself to having so offended everyone that I no longer had to worry what they thought, I found complete freedom to create. You don't want to email me back? Fine. I'll just write another story. You don't want to publish my three stories? Fine, I'll refine them and rework them so they are stronger. You are miffed at my post about Oprah? Excellent. I guess that means I don't have to post for awhile and can focus on my novel!
I had no idea that the universe could have such a harsh, yet knowing, hand. I will use the remaining silence (but really, how much longer?) to fine tune a few more things. And then, who knows? I might just post them here. No comments required.
