I’m not sure what to say any more. I want to say something new and insightful, something beautiful and deep. I want to riff on an idea, to take it and transform it and expound upon it, want to pounce on something we’ve been taking for granted, excise it and expose it, explain it, define it.
Or maybe I want to say something funny, something clever. I want to draw an unexpected comparison between two apparently dissimilar concepts and evoke amusement. I want to take a picture that illustrates an idea and then caption it with something that recontextualizes the image in a manner both unexpected and droll.
Perhaps I want to be honest, want to expose my insecurities, to describe what I’m scared of, what I hope for, try to seek or share some degree of common humanity with the rest of the world. I want to show that I am human, but with perhaps an emphasis on my own quirks and idiosyncrasies, and build a bridge of common-ground differences between us.
I don’t know. I’m tired. I think I want to want to write something new, now. I want to find the place that I don’t know where to look, and I don’t know where to look to find that place. I’d like to expand beyond my comfort zone, but honestly that makes me kind of uncomfortable.
I want to know whether I’m writing for me or for you.
I want to know whether I’m writing for the past or the present or the future.
Actually, maybe I don’t.
Maybe I don’t care whether I say anything insightful, incisive, cutting and clear, cunning and clever. Maybe I think that all of that boils down to sophistry, games we play with words, insignificant and self-indulgent. Maybe it just appears to have significance because that which it commentates upon appears to have significance. Maybe the chain goes on forever, a who-gives-a-fuck pattern of irrelevance, pompous jackasses all the way down..
Maybe I don’t care if I’m funny. Maybe I suspect that the scope of humanity which happens to share a sense of humor with me is almost vanishingly small, and most of the time my effort is wasted. Maybe I’m not sure if I can be amusing consistently enough to make it a worthwhile pursuit.
Maybe I don’t give a shit if what I say is the truth. The truth is not a monolith, it comes in many pieces and the shape of those pieces shifts and melts like chocolate when they are held too hot and too close. A truth today is a lie tomorrow, and pretending honesty only makes you twice the liar in the long run.
Maybe I don’t know if there’s anything new under the stars. Maybe it isn’t important to me whether there is. Maybe the extent of the future is constrained by the past and my capacity to see what exists beyond myself is constrained by my many years of habitual self-ness. Maybe it’s not important.
I don’t want to know how stupid I am.
I don’t want to know how irrelevant I am.
I just want a moment in time where I know who I am, and what I’m doing, and why.
Which is probably too much to ask.