Do What Gives You Life

Do What Gives You Life


          Write, my son!  Write as if your life depended on it.  No, better yet, write because it is your life.  Write because it's what you do.  No, better yet, write because it's who you are.  And nobody can take that from you.  You create, you pour straight from that place where reality is unfiltered and let it take shape through your vessel, to escape and show the beauty from which you are made.  Write as if you don't have a choice.  Write because you are.

     People often ask me what I do.  For the past few years I have been hesitant to to answer that question because I am not the sum of my deeds.  Honestly I can do absolutely anything and any box any one person tries to put me in will be smashed rather quickly.  I don't always answer that I'm a writer when asked such a question, because really I just hated the box that such a name creates, and to be honest, there are certain assumptions people make and attach to the 1st world small talk question of "what do you do?"  What people really mean, is "what do you do for a living" and sometimes if people actually make the entire statement, I answer, "I live".   

     More recently I've felt more comfortable with telling people that I'm a writer.  Well, really most of this has happened over the course of the last year since I've been married, and Stef, my wife, is quick to tell people I'm a writer and I've published two books because she knows I'm not going to say anything about it.  Usually then, there's a money question:  "Do you make any money doing that?"  Personally, no.  A couple hundred dollars here and there.  The more artsy types usually ask about my process or what kinds things I write. Even in the realm of writing I don't stay contained to one genre or experience.  So when the question comes, "what do you write?"  I don't know.  I just write.

     Why do I write?

     I write because it's who I am.  I write because I enjoy it.  I write sometimes even though it drives me mad.  I write because it's who I am.  I write because I can't stop.  I write because God has given me a gift and it is my honor to share.

      For a sneak peak to those of you who are curious (or may have actually read one of my books:  Lambs that Howl or Outside Time and the Voice in Your Ear both available at amazon.com), here is an example of something that I write:

Once Upon a Time I Stood on a Beach, Stared at a Burned Down Hotel and Thought about Fishermen:

I eat degrees for brunch

I boil hypertext at 481 Kelvin

I have a line in the mouth of a giant great white

I am the ojo del tigre, the crop of the cream, the cake sitting under the icing

I sting like a scorpion and suck the poison out

I am what drugs are afraid of

I am the trip to end all trips, the hallucination and the jump to hyperspace

I am a tree of life

I am the ark of the covenant

I run barefoot and perpendicular to the horizon

I sing like the desert at night and hiss like a hard rain on winter’s edge

I am every silver city and ashes in your mouth

I am the lake of fire

I burn so hot that it’s hard to see me

I am he and she given new eyes to make new eyes

I roll hard

I eat bugs sometimes

I find boredom to be an interesting topic,

and again,

I burn so hot that it’s hard to see me.

 
  
     Do what gives you life even if no one else notices.