the blank page

ahh, the blank page. at once so liberating and so initimidating, the question (to love,) is: why do i write?

the answer is a mish-mash of catharsis, vanity and aptitude.

i write because i need to write. it is catharsis. when i write, i take the time to study my motives, to listen to how i've come upon a conclusion or why i've arrived at a certain place. if god is truly in the details, i understand god is understanding. i sense the little steps of meaning.

recently i have come to the realization that i have something of an authority complex. it did not just dawn on me one day while napping in the park. i arrived at this epiphany through a complex series of smaller epiphanies.

from an early age i distrusted the adult world. i had three childhood homes. in the first, my grandfather sat around the house collecting disability and devising new and improved ways of tricking people and padding his bank acount all the while tinkling cubes of ice in a glass of scotch whiskey. he was a severe man, wise in the ways of the world, dumb to the means of true happiness. next i lived in an abusive home wherein actions were dictated by a sinister drug; heroin. finally, i spent my teen years in a fundamentalist christian environment. instead of thoughtful answers to questions, instead of conclusions drawn from standing on the shoulders of giants, i received stock dogma.

writing has been my redemption and my reward. writing allows me to hear what impels me through my days. writing helps me to shhhhhhh.

it is funny too, i am so insecure about my writing. i want anyone who reads it to like it. i want them to consider it worth reading or at least satisfactorily written. moreso, i want someone who writes to consider it a quality product, (because i think in writing they must have some kindred aspect to myself.) simultaneously, i really do write for me and i could hardly care less how it is received or if it is received. (most of what i have written has never been seen or heard by anyone but me.)

still, i write. here, on a blog. in a file i call (ingeniously enough,) "writing," in email, on smack boards in cyberspace, in journals kept at the side of my bed, in the note pad of my blackberry, in a personal file at work, whenever and wherever. whatever. it is not a sentence, nor is it a glory. it simply is.