I can’t remember wanting to write. I was content with reading. Ever since I was a child, I was content with devouring (figuratively) anything with words. Be it Archie comics, the back of shampoo bottles, Nancy Drew, or some random encyclopedia entry, I must read it.
I was a very talkative child, and an honest (to a fault) one. I never had a problems with words, moreso in expressing them, I was pretty brash. I never had the urge to transfer things on paper, I actually hated writing as a child. I believed that if I can say it, why bother writing it down.
I remember hating composition when I was in grade school, it was because it will take me too long to finish because I would obsess over the appropriateness of the words and the grammatical rules. I never had the patience for it.
I remember being a copy reader for the school paper, I was chosen because I read a lot and was a bit conscious about grammar. I hated it for I never had the patience for facts. I only read the comic section of the newspaper. So whenever I lost during competitions I feel bad, then just shrug it off because I never liked what I was doing anyway. Then I started to envy my friends who are in feature writing, because it seems more fun to spin a story of your own than picking at someone else’s for mistakes then fretfully hoping that you still get the meaning intact. I started wondering about writing then.
Then at highschool I started writing fan fictions. I was infatuated with a friend so I started writing fan fictions as an outlet for those feelings. I never imagined us in those scenarios, but I- ok fine maybe I did a little bit but all those scenarios with us usually ends in break up and bitterness while my fictional characters get a happy ending (sometimes).
I also tried to dabble in poetry, and I sucked. I never had the patience to rhyme and fit words in the correct measure. I wasn’t too keen on symbolism either. So I abandoned it and stuck to prose.
I probably wrote a lot at that time, but never posted them all. I only let some of my friends read it, looking for feedback. They told me it was good, but I felt it was rubbish, so most of them are either unfinished or forgotten.
When I was in college, my father died. I did not know how to deal with my grief. I don’t like people pitying me, so talking to them about it is not an option. That was when I started keeping a journal. I sometimes write about myself in third person, describing my anguish in such a dramatic detail that I end up laughing. It was cathartic for me. I noticed then that my writing was darker than it used to be. I used the words “morose,” “darkness” and “quagmire” to describe my moods, and I probably exhausted all the synonyms for sad. It helped a lot, I can be weepy all I want without my notebook offering me lukewarm platitudes and pathetic reassurances that everything would be alright. I just needed someone to listen, and writing gave me just that.
That happened a few years ago. This blog now is somewhat my journal where I can pour all my thoughts without being judged. I know this is a public domain, and that people will be able to read it but I am using a pseudonym and there are slim chances that people would actually read all the crap I’m spouting in this blog.
Anyway, bottomline. Writing used to be something I hate, now it has become my salvation, my lifeline.