Journal of a Sabbatical

September 2, 1998

metatrees, metajournals, metagovernors

Copyright © 1998, Janet I. Egan

The first time I saw these two trees on Plum Island I exclaimed: "They're dancing with each other." Since then I call them the dancing trees. For years I've wanted to paint them, but I've never learned to paint - although I made a few attempts with watercolor. I can't draw. But everybody tells me I take better than average photographs. I don't know if photography is art. I've been told it is and I've been told it isn't. And what do you call manipulating photos in Photoshop? But in any case, my success with the kingbird graphic - at least I think it's pretty good - created by manipulating a photo encouraged me to experiment with a recent photo of the dancing trees. I think I took too much red out of the sky, but other than that I'm happy with the result.

The only trouble is I spent about an hour and a half or so getting the image just the way I wanted it. At that rate, I can't possibly do a graphic for the journal every day unless I give up even more activities. Or unless the entire entry is the graphic. That might actually work because I am becoming less and less interested in writing. Maybe, interested isn't the right word here. I almost wrote "willing" but that's not it either. Writing just feels too hard.

It's been a long time since I did writing practice or any kind of spontaneous writing. I labored over the poem I submitted for the Andover Anthology for weeks. Every word counts and every word must be perfect. Despite the praise I've gotten for my poetry from people I respect, I have lost confidence in my writing.

Mainly it's the journal writing I have lost confidence in. Maybe the poetry comes from a different place. In the journal I feel constrained in which subjects I can write about, how much to say and the language in which to say it. And how much of my inner life could anyone else stand to read about? It's tough to be reflective but not too revealing.

I often pick large subjects and then feel like I have to stick with them once I put them in the title even if the subject turns out to require a thoughtfully researched lengthy essay instead of a diary entry. Or I go ahead and write what I really think and then worry that I've angered or offended someone. (I still do want to see Bill Gates in a little black dress though :-) and I still want my picture taken by Richard Avedon while I'm washing litterboxes in my bleach spotted t-shirt with sweat running down the lenses of my glasses.) A minority opinion is still a valid opinion, but sometimes I have a hard time believing that.

I'm listening to the Democratic gubernatorial debate on the radio while I'm writing this. The Democratic candidates (Harshbarger and McGovern) sound remarkably similar to the Republicans (Cellucci and Malone) who debated last night. The degree of disagreement between the candidates is very small. I guess that's one of the things that bothers me in my writing: the range of acceptable opinions is constantly narrowing. Things that would have been conservative in my youth are liberal now.

Some pollster just called and asked if I was definitely going to vote in the primary on Sept .15 and if I were to vote in the Republican primary would I vote for Malone or Cellucci. The third question floored me though. Of the following issues, which is the most important to you: decreasing taxes, improving education, decreasing government spending, or restoring family values. Umm, only three of those seem to be within the power of the governor.

Ooh, this just in:the candidates disagree on whether to abolish the Registry of Motor Vehicles. Big whoop.

What's this all got to do with my writing? More than you may think. Notice how I haven't stated my position on the RMV. And which of the above three things within the governor's purview did I offer to the pollster? Should I or shouldn't I reveal that? I once lamented to a therapist that I couldn't make small talk with people because it's taboo to talk about politics or religion in social situations and I grew up only talking about politics and religion at the dinner table. What else do people talk about? Sex? Nope. You don't talk about sex in polite company either. That basically leaves the weather and the Red Sox, which is what most people talk about with strangers in New England anyhow. I do tend to write about the weather. Once at a poetry workshop, an instructor told me my poems were too meteorological. I'm too judgmental about the Red Sox to write anything too deep about them - and besides that it would get into highly emotional territory. Emotion is another taboo. And on it goes. Too much self-revelation. Too little self-revelation. Too much irony. Not enough irony. Clueless about irony. It just gets to be too much to think about before even a word comes out of my aching scrivener's palsied fingers.

Over the past several days, I've been reading selections from lots of online journals and comparing mine unfavorably to them. I admire people who can dash off perfectly structured paragraphs and string them all together into a coherent whole and still make it feel spontaneous - and do it all while holding down an full time job and reading a book a day. In my current blocked state, it can take me all day to write a journal entry. It takes me a month to read a book lately (Looking for the Lost took longer than that). It even takes me an inordinate amount of time to prune the bushes/chop down the vines. Just this afternoon, Tom said he couldn't imagine why it was taking me this long to cut down the bittersweet (he hasn't seen it - it really is twisted around itself so the vine is like steel rope to cut). I hack at it a little every day. That's all I can do. Just like the writing.