Just in case you guys are confused.

Since I don’t have things to write about, I’m writing about writing. I think that I’m going to keep that theme for a while because it’s something I don’t do as much. I appreciate the craft a lot and appreciate that God made language enjoyable.

That’s all. Bye.

A pool of thoughts

Rain, music, and a cup of hot tea. Ideal writing conditions.

Cloudy weather, cold room, aching shoulders, a cup of lukewarm tea. Usual writing conditions.

One needs to always be lowered into a different state of mind when writing. The creative process, for me at least, needs to borrow from a part of the mind that’s been compartementalized and reserved only for writing. This part of the mind has been untouched by the worries of the day, the stresses of the moment, and gets things added to when appropriate circumstances or thoughts arise.

Some of the things thrown in sink down to the bottom of the pool and are rarely retrieved, if retrieved at all. There are many things floating at the top, ready to be grabbed out as soon as time is made for it. Some of the things floating never make it out– they sink to the bottom.

I can write about writing and that alone serves as a kind of release. It’s a process, place in my mind, that’s so special and unique to me that I feel like I need to share it.

My identity as a Christian, as a science major, and as a writer– the first coloring the two following. Yet I find that my science is colored more by my faith than my writing is. The habit of writing sorrowful things has trained my hands too much that it’s difficult to break out of it.

Writing is my baby. You can take science away from me, albeit with a lot of force, but you can’t take writing away from me. Don’t do it. I’ll turn into a mess.

Writer = Artist?

Does my being a writer make me an artist? Or is a writer confined to the definition of using words alone to convey a singular effect?

Or perhaps the effect doesn’t need to be singular. Perhaps Edgar Allen Poe was being too narrow-minded.

Isn’t the wrenching of words, the melding of thoughts into the alphabet a way of art as well?

How to describe it?

When I begin to write, I see an empty canvas. One to be filled with words. It’s pretty obvious– that’s what a writer does, just as an artist fills in an empty canvas with lines, colors.

But there are so many times when I stare, write a few things, delete them, stare, attempt writing some more, then close the window in frustration. At least when I’m writing it down to tangible existence, I’ve already commited the pen to the paper. I must continue. But the transient nature of the words that are in a text box such as this makes me view everything in the box lackadaisically.

Being a perfectionist is sometimes nothing but a hindrance. Sure, it gives an eye for detail which is so crucial for writing but it’s often too frustrating to write something that doesn’t meet up to my standard, a standard that rests with the likes of literary masterminds. How can I join their ranks?

There is so much that moves through this mind, too much jittering, too much aching to be made tangible, comprehensible to people. Yet in an attempt to make it all interesting and worth reading, I put a thin layer of enigma, mystery, and ambiguity. It’s pathetic, sometimes. I want the reader to know exactly what I’m thinking and feeling yet that bit that I’ve purposely shrouded makes it feel as though it’s a secret only to me, making me somewhat giddy at the thought.

There’s no way to describe how I feel when I write. It’s a long, arduous process and often times, I want to give up, feeling as though I’m not good enough to even call myself a writer. Only in moments when unhappy thoughts or emotions are further exacerbated by circumstances, or one circumstance is further fueled by yet another one do I find enough raging and uncontrollable energy to write without thinking or editing. Or, as Anne Bronte brilliantly put it:

“When we are harassed by sorrows or anxieties, or long oppressed by any powerful feelings which we must keep to ourselves, for which we can obtain and seek no sympathy from any living creature, and which, yet, we cannot, or will not wholly crush, we often, naturally, seek relief in poetry.”

[I would also add writing along with the poetry bit.] So this is all to explain my long absence from this writing journal. This one is different from the other one I have– the other one is unapologetically candid, something that I wouldn’t feel comfortable sharing and others wouldn’t feel comfortable reading. It’s my sifting-through-my-thoughts writing journal. This one was created in hopes of fostering more refined writing from me but it seems as though I’m still too undisciplined.

We’ll see.

それでも私は人間ですわ

毎日こんなに一生懸命に勉強しても、クラスに行っても、これとあれを諳んじても、あたしは人間だ。あたしは心があるし苦しい、嬉しい気持ちも感じてる。。。

あたしが人間だのことをいつも忘れてしまう。

But even then, I’m still human.

I can memorize all that there is to in the world, forego all the personal pleasures that I could grant myself if I just decided to look up and breathe but in the end, there will be memories, there will be emotions and thoughts, swirling in my mind and these will produce some kind of an expression. A smile. Tears. Something.

And it’s in these times that I’m always reminded that I’m only human. And that it’s ok.

Neon Night

All the pictures of Japan show the most crowded streets at the most crowded time, and ubiquitous neon signs taking the attention over all else.

Neon lights illuminate not only the streets but also the sky, giving it a false, fluorescent hue. If the moon isn’t shying behind a large building, it looks out of place as a natural element, put into the background of an artificial setting with its moonlight drowned out by the neon.

It no longer feels like Japan anymore. Or Earth, for that matter. On those warm, summer nights, it feels like floating down musty sidewalks, as if it’s all part of a dream taking place on another planet.

Kyou wa…

The humidity isn’t something that I’m used to.

It’s the kind of humidity that swallows you from the inside out. As you breathe it in, your body becomes aware of the moisture in the air and reacts to it by perspiring.

The heat isn’t what’s causing me to sweat. It’s all the moisture, the wet nature of the air, that is making my skin a sticky emulsion of skin oils, sweat and humidity. A summer concoction.

Yet I still need to carry an umbrella. It might rain at any moment. It’s hard to tell with the gray clouds looming lowly in the air. I glance up at it every now and then, hoping for rain so that it will make the summer air relent a little.

And the cicadas sing their summer song, teasing me about the weather.

Madness

Sometimes it feels like a flurry of madness, compressed into that one moment.

I don’t know how people go mad but I can tell you that as I approached it and the possibility stretched before me, my mind panicked and with some kind of a built in mechanism, surpressed the thoughts and replaced them with pleasant things.

It seems that for most people, the body can detect and mask insanity. A defense mechanism to preserve the mind.

No love :(

Half the posts on here are me talking about my lack of updating. I.e. my being lazy. D:

Maybe I need to stop thinking that I can only post polished stuff on here? Because once I write something, I don’t want to touch it. D: It’s only revised if I revamp the whole entire thing. Like changing the point of view or something. Hahaha. I did that for my final short story for LTWR8A. Just changed everything but the plot. Hahaha. There’s something liberating about that.

Well, I am working on a short story. I have the idea down. And the title. I just need to write it now. 8D Which is what I am planning to do.

Really will try to make more of an effort to update this baby (don’t mind if people don’t read it, I just feel like I have an obligation to this journal since I made it for this specific reason), even if it’s just snippets.

San Mateo Bridge

I looked out from the small window on that plane, seeing the lighted bridge off in the distance. Each light was like a glowing pearl and as the plane accelerated and lifted up into the air, the bridge seemed like a golden chain along the Bay’s slender neck, or a string of lights taken from a carnival, which still retained its atmosphere of warmth and laughter.

There is something beautiful about that bridge.