So I decided to start a blog...

Last night I had an epiphany. I was talking with an old friend, and with her strong encouragement, I realized that all the time I have spent idealizing the success of people I have known throughout my life and then knocking myself down in comparison, I have been doing myself a disservice. For I have also been quite busy over the course of my own existence, gaining experience and hopefully a little wisdom, learning invaluable life skills, and exercising my creative muscles. The fact that certain people whose paths I have crossed may now occupy this or that position in the professional world is kind of irrelevant. Everyone still has to wake up each day and do their work. Some people’s work is more fulfilling, some is less. Some people make more money, others are just scraping by. Some of us have realized lifelong goals or dreams and are now moving on to other things, while those of us who have yet to come into our own still feel the yearning to strive for more. The plain fact is, each of us is on a very distinct path, and although I could choose to be discouraged by the success of another, I can also be inspired.

Today I feel inspired.

With Erin’s encouragement (shout out to the timelessness of friendship), I have decided to start a blog. That’s right. I’m taking the plunge. I’m not sure I’m ready for comments yet – that might be way too traumatic – but I definitely need to publish my work, my thoughts, my feelings, my stories… I have to get them out of the solitude of my own internal process, my aspirations. I have to share them with others and let them breathe – give them a chance to delight or disappoint, let them stand on their own and see what they’re made of… I’ve been through so much, I don’t believe I have anything left to fear at this point, at least when it comes to putting my work out there. What’s the worst that can happen? People won’t like it? Ooohhhhhh….. scary monsters!!!
____________________________________________________________

Ever since I can remember, I have loved reading. It was my first great escape. There was some family myth that I started reading when I was two years old, but I don’t think that’s true. I do know that I was given a very detailed book to read at the age of 4 or 5, called “The Wonderful Story of How You Were Born,” and I proceeded to give a full report to my kindergarten class. My parents heard all about that at parent/teacher conference night.

Somewhere along the line, I started writing. I remember having a diary somewhere around the 6th or 7th grade, filled mostly with detailed descriptions of trips to the mall. Since then, in addition to the mandatory school book reports and creative writing assignments, I have written letters, short stories, poems, feverish journal entries (more than I care to remember), plays, screenplays (never finished, of course), essays, treatments, and all matters of work related documents for the various management and marketing positions I have occupied in my professional life.

I LOVE to write. I love how it feels to let ideas flow through me and to watch them slowly take shape on the page. I love discovering what direction I’m actually going in, when I thought I was headed somewhere else. I love seeing characters that I have created come to life.

Of course I, like many people, grew to be very protective of my work over the years. For a time I was brave, and circulated my stories for comment from friends and colleagues, even had a couple of my one page plays produced, but aside from one South African feminist website that published two of my short stories about a decade ago, and one poem in college, I’ve never seen my work in print. Somewhere along the line, I began to develop a crust of fear that hardened a little with every tentative submission and subsequent rejection (I have made it a habit of periodically sending one of my stories to a literary magazine run by two sisters, called Glimmer Train, and they have regularly rejected each and every submission). At some point, I settled into a passive state of lethargy with regard to putting my stuff out there at all. Life, work, doubt, all seemed to overshadow my creative aspirations, and rendered me virtually silent.

But in the private woods of my mind, there are trees falling all the time – very loudly, I might add! In fact, sometimes it’s so noisy, I can barely concentrate. There are characters, situations, plot lines, all jostling for attention, distracting me from the exigencies of daily life, which, in and of themselves, are numerous. And now, my life has come to a head, and I can no longer tolerate the status quo. It’s time for a major change.

Almost eleven months ago, I lost my husband and life partner of 22 years, Ivor Balin Pannell. People who knew him will tell you that he was a force to be reckoned with… A man of extraordinary wisdom and patience, seriousness as well as humor, he taught me more about adversity and courage than anyone I have ever known. He was born with a genetic disorder called sickle cell anemia, a terrible disease that affects the blood and causes extraordinary bouts of pain as well as major organ and joint damage. My life with him was incredibly rewarding, but also filled with challenges that pushed me to my absolute limits. Together, we learned about love and friendship and struggle. We also created a son, Josiah, who is now 7 years old.

So I’m a newly single mother, working sometimes upwards of three or four jobs or projects at a time, trying to keep afloat financially in the midst of a terrible recession, struggling to keep my house clean and organized, and dealing with perhaps the single greatest emotional transition of my lifetime. And yet, there are still those nights when I will stay up until all hours working on a short story, because I just have to do it. I don’t know why, I just know that there is still this creative fire that burns inside me, and all of these other draws on my energy seem less like obstacles than they do inspiration.

When I was in my teens and twenties, and I was going through some particularly angst ridden episode of the drama that was then the hallmark of my days, I used to say to myself, “There’s good material in all this.” Well, if that was true, then by now I have accumulated a goldmine of material, and it’s time to hammer it into something shiny and polished to admire, and have the satisfaction of knowing that I created it. And since I’ve now hit the point where I’ve lived out some of the scariest things imaginable… and survived… I’m no longer frightened by the prospect of sharing my words with you.

Like so many other creative souls, I have a tremendous need to be told how wonderful I am, even at the same time as I yearn for constructive criticism that will help to make my work better. When I say better, I mean, closer to the essence of what it is trying to be. In my work as well as my life, I tend to take things to the nth degree. I don’t like to hold back, and whenever possible, I’m out there pushing the limits. I don’t know if my work always reflects this desire, but that is something I’m working on! Some would say I have boundary issues. I prefer to think of it as taking liberties, questioning authority, defying limitations.

Or maybe I just like being a bad girl…

In any case, I’m officially inaugurating this blog, and I am going to try like hell to put it out there with courage, and without expectation. I am at what you might call a pivotal point in my life, and can think of no better way to celebrate than to take a leap into the ocean of creative possibility. Fortunately, I am a pretty good swimmer.

I will begin the task of uploading stories, essays and other random pieces of writing that I need to share, starting with a couple of new pieces. Soon I’ll go back to my older stories. They have been holed up for too long, and I warn you, some of them may be a little mildewy. But I can’t keep them private any longer. Seriously, if I don’t get them out of my head, I may become physically ill. So this is truly an act of self preservation.

I have no idea what a woman like me, pushing 50, a widow, a single mom, is supposed to sound like, look like, act like or be. I’m pretty sure I get to make it up as I go along, though. I guess we’ll see what happens…


© Deborah Oster Pannell
August 23, 2010