Wednesday
There’s a pattern to this whole thing, you know. Monday, I get little done. Tuesday, I write ten fairly good pages. Wednesday, I stare at the computer for an hour and a half thoughtfully drinking coffee, write a page, throw it in the “scrap” file, and start over. By one or so, I begin to wonder if the whole project is actually worth it and if a collection of largely disjointed postmodern essays on magic is going to appeal to anyone but me and my friends. By 1:30, I’ll resort to grim determination and chemical enhancement (caffeine!), because I want to write seventy or eighty more pages before the end of next week. At some point, I’ll log on to complain on my blog.
And by 2:30, I’ll make cabbage soup and decide to spend the rest of the day goofing off. I’m going to take tomorrow off, too. Maybe go into to the City, visit a museum or something. I need some stimulation. This morning, I looked at my computer chair and thought “I have spent the last week sitting on that for twelve or more hours a day.”
June 13, 2007 at 1:29 pm
I’ve done exactly the same thing today…except, at the end of the day, I didn’t even write a blog entry about it. I just logged on and read yours.
PS–Keep the faith on the book!
June 15, 2007 at 4:37 pm
Perhaps I noted this previously – I have practiced postmodern, or if you will, chaos magic (are they not much the same?), the past several years, without being aware of either term. So, as someone perhaps in tune with your thinking, I quote Ramsey Dukes’s S.S.O.T.B.M.E…
“So here is our final test for Magic. An author weeping in the early hours of the morning at his failure, because booksellers have joined the rest of the business world in believing that the branding is more important than the product. What is he to do?
“He should recognize that the idea that ‘the branding is more important than the product’ is itself a Magical principal of such profundity to almost amount to a definition of Magic itself. He should allow the world to make its choices as he has made his own. He should consider whether life might not have intended more for him than simply to be a conduit for philosophies. He should recognize that the end of writing will free great reserves of enthusiasm for other projects.”
And so, I am reading your book. I believe I am growing. And so, I thank you.
June 15, 2007 at 4:46 pm
Jeffrey: I have got to reread that book, I think. You’re absolutely right.
(The difference between chaos magic and postmodern magic? We postmodernists don’t have a symbol we can paint on a leather jacket — it’s really a problem)
June 16, 2007 at 3:43 am
Patrick, I’ve searched in vain for an e-mail link, for I only wished to alert you to an unusual event which transpired just this morning. I’m afraid it’s a bit off topic, but, because I can’t locate your e-mail addy, I’ll simply drop the link here… http://consilience.typepad.com/teachers_lounge/2007/06/everythings_a_n.html
If you’d be so kind as to send me your e-mail…