Zen in Darkness

i’ve never won anything that’s really mattered to me. and it’s never mattered to me that i win anything.

then the first Philippine Graphic/Fiction Awards came around, and suddenly all that mattered was that i win, that i be acknowledged by my peers as someone with real talent, with ideas.

i set about writing the story i’d always wanted to write, that i simply never got around to before; a science fiction story, real science fiction, the kind about ideas and possibilities and imagination and what-ifs.

i had a clear picture of the story in my head, and i’ve had it for a long time: it would be about a humanity that so desperately wanted to escape the confines of the earth, the solar system, to reach the stars; about how mankind would evolve in the Void, into something barely recognizable as human; how mankind would become something else, something alien, and in that self-alienation, find out what it is to be human…

and i wrote it. after a few weeks (a record for me at the time) i finished the story. and when i laid down its final words, i thought it was the best material i’d ever written. and i turned my story in with pride, feeling i had a better than average chance of winning; at least, i thought, it would be good enough to see print in the anthology that i thought would no doubt result from the contest.

my story wasn’t even shortlisted for the award.

not to be too dramatic, but i was devastated. when i learned that the authors of the shortlisted stories had been contacted by the contest administrators, and i’d received no such call, i closed-up, locked myself up within myself, wanting nothing better than to throw away the key, to crawl under a rock forever.

i’d reread my story a couple weeks ago. i’d already started having my doubts then. rereading the story i’d thought was the best material i’d ever written, i realized what a load of crap that was. i was surprised at how i could even think anything so puerile and just plain wonky could be considered anybody’s best work. but i still liked it then, and still hoped it had a good chance of snagging the award for me.

in writing, i’d thought i’d found the one thing i was good at, the one thing i truly had a talent for, the one thing i thought i could be better at than anybody else… but i needed someone to agree with me. i needed others to see what i honestly thought i saw in myself. i needed someone to tell me i’d made the right decision, giving up the safety and security of my old life for this dream.

they didn’t. nobody did.

i hibernated in my self-loathing, and Mabel had to tend to me (patiently, oh so infinitely patiently… Mabel, my Angel) as though i were ailing, physically. that’s how bad it felt: like i’d suffered a blow so mortal, i never wanted to get out of bed, ever again.

i never wanted to write anything again.

but what could i do?

so i packed Audrey up, drove myself to a coffeeshop, and stared at a few paragraphs i’d written the week before.

i wrote a bit, and the few paragraphs that were little more than a description of a character whose name had popped into my head last week started to shape itself into a story. but i was by no means productive, and i barely got anywhere with the words. i went home, still dejected.

then something odd happened. something clicked in my head, just sort of fell into place. suddenly, i realized, i didn’t feel half so bad. i checked myself. it was true: i was ok.

that’s when it hit me.

it doesn’t really matter if i’m acknowledged by my peers. it doesn’t matter if other people think my writing is crap. i do, too, after all.

the fact is, i like my crap. and i absolutely LOVE writing, better than just about anything else.

writing is my zen. it always has been, it always will be. that’s what this is all about. it’s not about being talented, or gifted, or being better than anybody else. hell, i never really believed i was any of those things to begin with. it’s about doing the one thing i truly love doing; about being who i am.

i love my crap. i love writing my crap even better. i can only hope that, someday, someone will love it just a fraction as much as i do, because really, i love it so much that’s all it would take.

but even if they never do, this is who i am. this is what i love doing.

so this is who i’m going to be, what i’m going to do.

i’m a writer, and i will write.

*

i must be the luckiest guy alive, that i can do this, be this way, and still be loved by the most wonderful person i know, without whom my life will always be stale, no matter that i’m doing what i love.

Thanks, Mabel.

*

just so it's clear, none of this is to say that i no longer care to win such awards. on the contrary, winning still would have been a singular honor, and possibly the best thing that could have happened to me this year, in terms of my writing.

but, ah, such is life. and, though it goes against my entire being as doomsayer and all around pessimist, it's not the end of the world.

guess i must be growin' up summat.

so there.