"When you mock a book, you mock a person's soul..."

Today's post is hard to write. 


Well, technically, all posts are hard to write. At least for me. I am mostly into situational humour. So when I actually have to think of something funny of my own: yeah, it's kind of like poking an open wound with a sharp object. I don't need to be funny, of course. But I like to be. There are enough smart, eloquent people blogging on serious issues. I couldn't possibly compare. So I'll just settle for re-tweeting them.


But the world can always use another laugh. After all, prices are rising, the economy has well and truly tanked, the government continues to shaft us, the middle class is virtually gone, so hell, if we don't have laughter left, then what the bloody hell do we have?


Well, and this brings me neatly onto the point of this post, one thing that none of that can take away: our humanity.


I am somewhat of a dichotomy. Not quite the right word but I try to use it where I can. 


There are probably 10 people in the entire world that know me to be a writer. And only 3 of them have ever read my stuff. It's not that I particularly dread exposure. Well, no more than the average person. If the time comes, I am fairly certain I can handle it. Though, again, handle is a subjective term.


No, that's not the reason that I don't shout it from the rooftops. The truth is: those that know me out there in the 'real world' couldn't possibly reconcile who I am with what I write. Or should I say: who they know me to be. And therein lies the problem. Like countless others, who I am is buried underneath a shell. 


The first time that my girlfriend read my writing, she turned to me and said, "Why do you never tell me any of this stuff?"


Because I can't. It's really just that simple. For her, more than anyone, I've tried. 
But you can't unlearn more than twenty years of silence. You can't knock down countless walls.


My outer trappings are a joke. Sarcasm. 'Half-wit,' my friends might say. ;-) When you're forced to hone something as a shield, it becomes a habit you forget to break.


I only started writing just last year. Creative stuff, that is. The internet has been a boon to me in other ways: specifically anonymity. To anyone who doesn't know me, I am a totally clean slate. And that's what writing is to me: a slate. There's no need for pretending. A story doesn't judge or tell me who I need to be. But what it is... is the way I see the world, my innermost thinking--feelings. 


In short, no matter how abstract, those words are me.  


And not the me I have to be: the boss, the friend, the joker. Not the me society dictates. My writing lets me be the child that I used to be... not the adult who's been forced to grow a shell.


It's taken me a while to understand this. Along the way, I've made a million mistakes. So I guess this point is as relevant to me as anyone who might care to agree with me: when you mock a book, you mock a person's soul.

“I want you to go round the table and introduce yourself.”

Day One

“I am Sarah.”

In truth, I don’t exactly remember how the introductions went. But in that moment, the remaining five days of training seemed a little less scary. Unless you consider that the things that Sarah and I had in common were a 

shared love for girls and a shared hatred for the world.

Five years on, things haven’t changed.

“I want you to go round the table and introduce yourself.”

Unbelievably, 50% of the world still thinks this is a valid ice-breaker, a way to put people at ease. 

The other fifty percent are new starts.

Desperately scouring my mind for titbits about myself that don’t make me look like a complete twat, I miss every single introduction. So does everybody else, of course. Stammering out something incredibly mundane like, “I am twenty six years old and I love football”, I arrive at the one thing that I don’t like to say about myself. It’s not that I am not proud of my roots. It’s not that I particularly hate the communist jokes. It’s not that, “I only know one Russian word -- vodka”, has ever gotten old. I just believe that it’s about as important to announce as, “Oh and I think I might be gay.” 

Mind you, these days I would announce, “I am gay,” but you get my drift.

“Where’s that surname from?” asks Facilities Manager who’s not so silently dying because he has to do this every week and he’s as sick of the charade as we already are.

I don’t know why I even bother. “It’s Russian.”

“I know a Russian word…”

Of course you do.

“And which account are you joining?”

This is where I need to backpedal a little. Being a call centre, GenEx is split into different accounts. I’ve landed a plum job as an agent in the top account. Sitting up a little straighter, I say with an appropriate amount of pride. “Techtronics.”

“Bad luck.”

 You what now?

Having worked in a bank, I chalk him up to one of those stalwarts who has gotten disillusioned with the organisation. You all know the type I mean: too old to start again, too young to think about retiring; their days are spent breaking, and breaking in, the hopes and dreams of everyone who follows in their footsteps.

Whatever, man.

The third time that I hear the same, “Bad luck”—this one accompanied by a chuckle and a rueful glance—the flutter of concern returns. The speaker is our trainer: a man in his sixties, with an eye for the younger ladies. Specifically his eye on me, as I would learn about three months later as he drunkenly professes his love for me. Trust me—not something that you need to see first-hand. His time is evenly divided between telling ribald, horridly inappropriate, jokes and lambasting Techtronics and GenEx. Occasionally—that one time—he remembers that he is there to teach us something. Unfortunately, the useless training material, a glimpse of which reads thus, 'If a customer complains, don't get mad', prevents any transfer of knowledge happening. 

Everyone ends up exhausted by 2:00pm.

Clutching my only non-comatose brain cell to my bosom, I muster all of my remaining social courage. “I am going to the movies on Thursday. You fancy coming?”

“Uh, depends on what you are seeing,” Sarah replies.

Neither of us remembers what movie I suggested, but her response is clear to this day. “Oh my God, I totally loved the first one!”

A fucking sequel. 

The story of my life.

"You do know that spiders can get under doors?"

Never ever tell your girlfriend that.

She will not appreciate it. I know I didn't.

When I close that door through to the spare room that has that elephant spider on the ceiling (which neither of us can reach), no, I do not want to know that it can get the hell out.

I don't care if I've ever asked you not to lie to me.

This is like the 'does this make my butt' thing. One should know the correct answer here. And it ain't the bloody truth.

So now I am sitting in Starbucks and all I can hear is maniacal laughter as the spider luxuriates in the comfort of our bed sheets, our clothes, our... GOD. *shudders*

All I can think of is Gloria from 'Modern Family', "... leave the head out for the other rats to see. It sends a message."

But we are too nice to kill spiders in our household.

Apparently.

So meanwhile, I'll go ahead and torment myself a little more with the images of what it might be up to while I am out of the house...

Thank, honey. You have a good day too...

We interrupt our irregular scheduling...

Hands up those who've started a blog and then shamefully neglected it within two weeks?

I see. Just me then.

Unemployment has been a funny animal. On one hand--I am now a self-published writer. It still feels weird to say that out loud. I haven't told any of my friends. Not even the online ones. Not because I am ashamed of being self-published. More because they'll look at me and I'll see them thinking, "Weren't you the sane one?" The online friends will just write, "So, what are you planning to do for money?"

Yeah. Cheers. Pre-emptively I know I need to get some new friends...

On the other hand--I've found just about everything under the (rare) sun in order to procrastinate. In full time employment, I managed 250,000 words in 2010. In 2011 I've managed 2,500 so far. And that's probably being generous.

God damn you, fear.

Because, yeah. It's shitting scary to 'live your dream'. Especially a new one. One that you've only had since February 2010. But one that you know is likely to be 'the one'. I now get why men (and women, I hear you add) are so terrified of commitment. What if you...*gulp* screw up 'the one'? The most important one? Then what? 

Better not to try.

And that's exactly the kind of thinking which make me stare at a blank sheet of paper and think, "Fuck." It's that kind of thinking which makes me look over previous work and think, "My best words are already behind me." It's exactly the kind of thinking which I can't let win.

I can. I will. I am a writer.

Buckle up.

This is only the beginning.