Wanting

I want.  I want.  I want.

 Doesn’t sound like much of a quote, but it is.  I read Carson McCuller’s The Heart is A Lonely Hunter and I loved it.  The particular paragraph where this was found has never left me.  It reads:

 

"She thought a long time and kept hitting her thighs with her fists. Her face felt like it was scattered in pieces and she could not keep it straight. The feeling was a whole lot worse than being hungry for any dinner, yet it was like that. I want-I want-I want was all she could think about--but just what this real want was she did not know."

 

This particular passage does not alter the story itself.  It is proof of McCuller’s beautiful writing, but again, this moment in this book is just that.  And yet, this moment in her book has lasted a lifetime for me.  Not literally, of course, but certainly since I first read the words.

For so long, I have not ever known what I wanted.  I could tell you what I didn’t want: Where would you like to eat?  I don’t know, but not McDonalds, etc.  Somewhere along the way I stopped giving myself permission to dream.

For the first time in a long time, I know something that I want.  Something big.  Something that I will have to really work hard for.  Something that I will have to wait for.  Something that I will have to prove that I really do want by not giving up.  Even if I work really hard and even if I do not give up, there is still a chance that this dream will not happen.  I understand that.  I think it will be worth trying for.

 Today I have a dream.  Want with me.  I want, I want, I want…



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How do I start?

Most days I do not know what to write or what to say.  My husband says that I am scared to look in my heart.  That it is like peeking under a rock and then running away.  I think I agree with him.  I am afraid, afraid that if I look, nothing will be there.  I have always said there are two kinds of people in the world: those who create art and those who appreciate art.  I have always called myself the latter but it is the artist I wish to be.  They say in order to create you must first be willing to do so poorly.  I feel like I can’t do that.  Or won’t.  I want to create.  I think creating is beautiful.  Therefore whatever it is I might create should be perfect.  But this is all wrong.  I have to learn to wander and linger inside my soul.  I have to listen fiercely to the tiniest of whispers inside myself.  I need to stop relying on feelings—as in the need to FEEL creative before picking up a pen.  I need to immerse myself. I need to try and try and try again.  I read this recently: When do you make the time? They say, and it’s impossible not to. Art is oxygen is faith is sanctuary. This is how I want to be with my writing.  I want to have a voice.  I choose to exercise this voice.  I have to because there is no other way.