I have been staring at the same blank page for two weeks. Granted, I’m not knee-deep in fortnight stink (suspend imagination, please, if you ever want to look at me without gagging) and the state of my tummy has not been compromised. I blame it on living with the parents. They seem to unable to stomach the idea that a writer with a block would just want to hunch over the beckoning prompter, damning in its every blink, and wallow in no certain amount of self-pity and 9Gag posts. It would, however, have been better for my heroic agony if they had come around to force me to take a shower and swallow bread. But no, their mere presence commanded my sensitivity to body hygiene and food pyramids and the calls of Kuih Kapit, because my holistic upbringing was designed to suit the path of a 9am-5pm future, not hobo writer.
In between all that I also managed to hold down a full-time job, berkecoh-ed with a few of the most awesome people I know on Cameron Highlands, and generally tried to have a social life. I know, my tortured-writer-with-no-fun-and-salary street cred is in shreds. What else can I depend on to sell any of my books?
In my defence (because I really want to sell my books), the blank page have been hovering before me in all these two weeks. It haunted me, casting a semi-transparent veil over my visual. I saw it when I eat, I saw it when I sleep. I saw it when I Facebook-ed, I saw it when I emailed my boss. I sometimes forget to see it when I am too busy laughing my ass off at whatever Jee/Wan Qi/Eileen/Roya/etc said, but I will compensate by seeing it doubly hard afterwards. I promise.
On rare occasions when I actually sit down and type on the blank page, I saw it most. All its whiteness. And space. And potential. And risks.
I retreated, unable to remember how the words form and the fingers tap. I tried to wrap my head around the page but the rust of un-writing had long arthriticked my mind. I can no longer tell people that I am a writer without the certainty that the lie was written all over my face. I read other people’s prose and wondered how the hell they did it.
It was all very dramatic.
My worst fear had come true. I left the States wondering if I will now be immune to the suffocating mentality that seems to pervade the Malaysian air. The same mentality that had me fumbled my column every month, developed a strong dread for writing, and blind-folding myself to what is now clear as day. I wondered if I could maintain that spontaneous voice and borderless thinking which the Americans have taught me – the same one that had me discovering that I actually love making up stories as much as reporting them, and whipping off that darkness which I insisted on groping in. I wondered if I can still be curious, wide-eyed, eager and inspired.
For a while, I thought I could. My first few months back was amusing, and refreshing, and comforting. I could find food and company after 12 am. I could pronounce water and not ‘warer’. I could relish the joy among familiar loved ones with their familiar sense of humour. I could be pampered, and pamper in return.
But I did not write my blog.
It slowly became I could not write my blog. It was supposed to be my journal, where I record life and all its life-ness, but I wrote nothing.
It was like a brain-constipation. I had so many things I want to express, but it just won’t come out. I live my life with the engorgement in my mind that could never find the smooth exit.
You did not just read me equating my thoughts to crap.
Anyway, brain-constipation was major discomfort, as anyone with the bowel equivalent would understand. My mind was suddenly filled with things that I cannot do. Boundaries and bonds. I thought, this is it. The gated mindset had finally caught me.
Or maybe, I was the one who caught it instead. After all, it is probably far more convenient to whine about writer’s block than filling a blank page with words that at least looked like it had passed through the lobes. It was easy to blame it on "the limiting Malaysian mentality" than to admit that I’m just not doing my best.
I had thought about giving up blogging. Giving up on my journal. But I read once that “Don’t give up on the thing that you cannot spend a day without thinking about it.”
So, here I am. If none of the above makes sense, don’t worry. I will explain it once it starts making sense to me.
If I’m lucky, you’ll see me here again. If you're lucky, this would be my last whining-about-writing post.
In the meantime, I need to nurse that Drummer-Boy-shaped absence in my heart with some Pratchett.
Good night, y’all.
