Looking Back at Untrod Paths

One of my passions is hats. Not just any old cap, though. And, not those frilly, frou-frou ladies hats that make such a spectacle on Kentucky Derby Day.

I mean classic hats, the kind of felt or straw hats that graced heads during the golden days of cinema. My personal favorite is a nice felt fedora or Trilby like Bogart, Bergman, or Bacall would have worn. Of course, I’m also partial to a nice straw Panama like Paul Henreid, Edward G. Robinson, or Gregory Peck sported in their films.

What does that have to do with paths not taken? Sadly, quite a bit. A few years back, I bought a gorgeous Montecristi Panama hat from Brent Black, and it’s still the pride of my hat collection. It has surpassed the two Trilbies I own from Lock & Co of London, but I digress.

Anyway, during the process of selecting and ordering my hat, I chatted a fair bit with Brent Black, hatter extraordinaire. Knowing me, the conversation probably included me making a comment like, “I envy you your job. What a great business!” Mr. Black promptly replied with, “Well, why don’t you consider getting into the business?”

From there, we chatted about hatters in New York that I might apprentice with so I could learn to block hats. We even briefly touched on the possibility that I’d relocate and work with him a bit to really polish my skills. The idea petered out, probably because I lacked confidence in myself at the time. This was shortly after the academic world had gleefully pummeled my work and self-confidence.

Now, wounds licked and (mostly) healed, I wonder if I let a golden opportunity pass me by.

A Shift in Focus

Thus far, November has been an interesting month. I heaved a sigh of relief last week that the 2012 Presidential campaign finally came to an end, which also meant an end to the flood of campaign commercials. Living in New York City, the local networks play ads for New York candidates, New Jersey candidates, and Connecticut candidates. I’m so glad I won’t see those people’s names or faces for a little while. And, I’m certain I speak for a lot of political junkies when I say I’m quickly reaching the point where I hate all politicians and all political parties equally. The Citizens United decision was a fiasco, and it’s time for a Constitutional change that outlaws the SuperPACs and corporations buying elections.

But, I digress. Politics is absolutely the last thing I wish to discuss this week. Instead, I’m looking at a shift in focus as a writer in my creative work. This shift was prompted by my attempt to participate in NaNoWriMo again this year. I’ve tried this in the past, typically with dismal results. This year, sadly, was no different. I quickly found myself behind in the word count by the first weekend. A 2-day migraine this past week ensured that I won’t be catching up this month.

Between NaNoWriMo and a mystery writing class I took about a decade ago, I have a few different novels in various stages knocking around in a drawer. Slowly, the idea is dawning that writing a novel may not be the right move for me as a writer at this stage of my career. I recently saw a suggestion for poets to try writing a poem a day for a poetic version of NaNoWriMo, and somehow that project seems more attainable than cranking out 50,000 words in 30 days does. Therefore, I’m going to shift focus starting tomorrow morning and work on writing a poem a day until mid-December.

What challenges have you attempted recently? How did they turn out? If you weren’t successful, how can you reshape the challenge so that it’s more attainable?

Creatively Adrift

This week, my online poetry writing class started. I love reading poetry, and I admire those who write good poetry. To me, a good poet is the most gifted writer because she or he can convey important information in the most concise way possible. I also love the wordplay involved with poetics, the way poets use a word’s multiple meanings in the same text.

While I love poetry, I’ve never considered myself a poet. I’ve dabbled in it a bit, which I think is true of many writers. But, I’ve never shared my efforts with anyone. I’m a perfectionist, and my work has never felt “worthy” of sharing. While that’s also true of my prose, I’m more comfortable sharing my prose works with others because I write in prose more often. And, I’m opinionated. (Hence, this blog.)

My poetry class requires us to post poems for our instructor to review each week. Twice during the class, we’ll also post poems for our classmates to read, which terrifies me. However, I’m trying to approach this class with a willingness to take risks. That’s because Jen recently reminded me of an article I read about a year ago, which talked about how many people aren’t afraid of failure. Instead, they’re afraid of success. That article was a bit unnerving because I saw a reflection of myself.

Because of that article, I think my fear of this class is prompted by an opportunity for growth. That is, my terror at writing and sharing my poems could be a fear of success, meaning this is a step I ought to take in my writing life to become the writer I want to be. Since that could be possible, I’m trying to face my fear in hopes that some growth and improvement as a writer will be the end result. Keep your fingers crossed this works out.

The Artist and the Abyss

Nietzsche said if you stare into the abyss too long, the abyss stares back into you. That statement is especially true for artists, and I believe that all great artists – painters, sculptors, poets, novelists, photographers and so forth - often stare into the abyss. The abyss is the human condition, the human soul, the human experience. Artists look into the deepest, darkest part of the human soul or human nature, and they reflect back what they see through their art. The best art works like a mirror, showing us what we truly are as human beings. When a work of art touches upon truth, it’s because the artist successfully stared into the abyss and captured a moment that is universal to humanity. Those seeing this artwork see something internal, as if the artwork is a mirror to the person’s mind and soul. The artwork gets inside that person, showing her or him a truth that perhaps wasn’t understood until she or he saw that work of art.

I am not talking about the flawed concept that humanity has something common, a shared “human nature,” because I think that idea has been thoroughly debunked. To me, the concept of  “human nature” is, at its root, the thing that makes us all animals. That is, I think the only thing that is universally true for all humans is the thing that makes us animals. We all need food, water and shelter to survive, but that’s something that can be said for every species on the planet, whether animal or plant. Each being needs certain conditions to be met in order to survive, so “human nature” doesn’t raise us above the other animals. Instead, it marks us as another living being, but not one that is special or superior to the others.

No, what marks human beings as unique among the natural world is our craving for truth and our attempts to demonstrate “truth” through art. The catch here is that “truth” is a fraught concept, one that is constructed culturally and may change over time. I don’t believe in universal truths, which is the idea that something is always true regardless of location or cultural mores. Instead, I believe that truth is a cultural concept, an idea that only exists within its cultural moment. Truth, to me, is as flexible and variable as “right” and “wrong.” All three concepts are cultural constructs. That is, someone in Omaha may think that it’s wrong to steal food from a grocery store. In another time and place, that act of theft would be condoned (or perhaps celebrated) if the culture surrounding the act had different social values. The idea that “human nature” means that certain things are always right and other things are always wrong is at the heart of every war over religion or politics. The mistaken belief that “we’re right and they’re wrong, so we must conquer and free them from their wrong ways of thinking” has brought more horror and tragedy to the world than we can possibly understand.

To me, an artistic truth is the closest we get to a shared “human nature” or “common human condition.” That is, artistic truths frighten us because great art can transcend its cultural moment and touch us across time. That’s because the artist has to grapple with the abyss. By staring into the abyss, she or he has faced down the deepest, darkest parts of the human psyche, and she or he has also stared in the bright, full sunlight of humankind’s most beautiful aspirations. These events occur every time the artist created new piece of art. If the artist is successful at staring into the abyss, she or he will create a great work that touches many people, a work that withstands the cultural shifts and reaches across the things that divide us from one another. But each attempt to look into the abyss risks the artist's soul, her or his creativity and perhaps even the artist’s very life. For if the artist grapples with the abyss and loses that battle, no art is created. In this instance, the artist may well go mad like Ernest Hemingway did.

Each time the artist approaches the abyss, she or he sends up a silent, secret prayer - “Please let me create something truly worthy this time. Let this experience bring forth a work of art that can withstand the tests of time and transcend my cultural moment. And, if I don't survive this interaction with the abyss, then please grant me enough time and sanity to finish this work of art. If the abyss should win, let this final work of art stand as a witness to my struggle with the abyss, a monument to the creative endeavor.”

American society often cuts its funding for artistic endeavors when economic times are tough, and our current moment in history is no exception. However, we fail to recognize the importance of artistic endeavor, particularly at moments of great social change. American society is facing economic and social pressures that will reshape our nation, changes that will shape and change what America stands for, for all time. Funding artistic endeavors is crucial to understanding exactly what we face and how it may shape us. Without artists gazing into the abyss for us, without their efforts to envision the best and worst possible outcomes of our present challenges, we won’t know which path to choose. Art shows us what we are and what we can be, both the good and the bad. Without artists gazing into what could be possible, we are walking along a dark path unguided.

Too Big to Fail But Too Small to Try

I’ve been doing some research into career coaching, with the thought of looking for a career coach to help me take my writing and editing business to the next level. One website I saw today left me feeling uncomfortable. The site had this question posted, “What would you do if you knew you couldn’t fail?”


Ever since reading that question, I’ve been uneasy. You see, I can’t answer it. Now, I think a lot of people I know would struggle to answer it, so I’m probably not alone in realizing I don’t have an answer, But, since I’m the introspective type, I’ve been trying to figure out why I can’t answer the question and why it makes me uncomfortable. And, I think I’ve identified two reasons for my disquiet.


First, I realized that I’m not sure what I’d attempt if I knew I’d succeed at it. That is, I haven’t allowed my dreams to get that big. The questions begs me to dream of something big and grand and exciting, and my imagination can’t break its boundaries and dream big enough to do the question justice. Since I consider myself a dreamer, I’m really disappointed to realize that I can’t think of some really big, exciting, “totally ludicrous” dream that’s a worthy answer to that question. I’ve somehow fettered my own imagination, and I never realized it until reading that question.


My second problem with that question involves fear. That question suggests that my life is limitless and full of potential, that I can accomplish anything if I want it enough. And, that says that the “prison bars” I see in my life are of my own making. That is, the things that keep me from the mundane, “realistic” successes I think I should have accomplished are barriers and obstacles that I created and imposed on myself.


In other words, that question pointed out two things. I haven’t allowed my imagination and my hopes to soar without limits. And, I haven’t attained the success I want because I haven’t allowed myself to be successful. Now that I’ve realized that, I have two new tasks for my life. First, I want to identify some dreams and aspirations that are worthy of the question. And, I want to break down the barriers and walls I’ve built that are holding me back from reaching those goals.