Repost from Facebook:
I’ve been writing again. On paper with a pen. It feels good. Changing and rearranging is harder on paper than on a computer screen. I have lines crossed out, written, crossed out again. Numbers to say “this goes here”, “no, wait, here”. The tracks of my efforts to put my heart on a page.
I keep remembering writing a paper in my first dorm room. Lathrop hall. The back door was right next to my basement room, and people were always knocking on the window to be let in. Their knocks would slowly undo the latch. I came back one day to find it open from people knocking and knocking. Sorry, no one is home.
I handwrote the paper’s paragraphs. My word processer still didn’t have the daisy wheel it was supposed to come with, and I hadn’t asked Seth if I could borrow his yet. The original way to cut and paste. I chopped the whole thing apart, laid the paragraphs out on the floor and rearranged them, connecting them with tape when I found where they fit. At the end, I held up my work. It was longer than I was tall. The sum of my words was bigger than me.
I had forgotten how good this can feel. Letting it all go out. Good or bad. Beautiful or useless. I’m trying for no secrets between my paper and I. For what I am writing to be true, I have to be honest. Even with myself. Even if it’s scary. Even if the words have the potential to hurt.
I think I wore myself out on words for a while. Too many “have to”s in school. Too many times I showed my heart to someone in a poem, and they were frightened. It can make a person hide what they feel very deeply.
But, here I have a new start. A new viewpoint. I am going to see if I can set myself free.