Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS writer.
I don’t know what to write. I do know that I must write. So many stories inside of me to be told, thought about, bubbling away forever, but in the end I am afraid that there is only one. The story I have avoided telling, the story I have never told. I think of it often, much more than I want to. There are reminders everywhere. In relationships, a fleeting memory, at the edge of a dream. Sometimes more tangible. Like in an unopened email attachment that has sat there for over a year. Or those papers in a box hidden away in the cupboard.
Why does this story remain untold? All of the usual suspects, I suspect – the fear of who else will read it, what will they think, of it and of me. The fear of getting inside my own head and becoming trapped in there. The fear of moving backwards when I have spent so much time moving forwards. Fear, fear, fear. The fear I feel everyday, even though I don’t really look at it. Hidden by the other fears that stops me from thinking about this Fear.
I’m good at not looking. I distract myself. I obsess about the germs on the seat of my pants, picked up out there somewhere. Visualise them transferring from my pants to my couch- my safe space. I track those germs, where will they go next? Who sat there? Where have they taken them? At what point can I stop worrying, tracking them? Are they alive? How long do they survive? What germs where they anyway?
More distractions. I avoid bridges when driving. If you drive over them, I will hang on and keep up a dazzling internal monologue to soothe myself. I can turn a 10 minute car ride into an epic journey, bypassing all bridges. So many bridges. Over freeways, trainlines, other roads, oceans. So many to avoid. It consumes me, tracking them, predicting them, avoiding them.
Where did this all come from? It’s the spillage from the stuff not easily hidden inside my head. The stuff I try not to see, but still know to fear. The fear that feels like quicksand. Struggle, don’t, fight, don’t, rest, stop, go. Haven’t I conquered? I feel like I have, that I’ve indeed won so much. But still it’s there. I feel it spreading.
So let me write it, this story, the real story. Let me tell you about it. Because, I don’t. I tell you the other stories, the ones I know will seduce, captivate, enrapture. I tell you about it and you urge me to hurry, that you can’t wait to read them. But would you be fascinated with the real story? The one I really want to write, the one that might just come out if I stop this procrastinating, if I just sit down and write. Would you be fascinated with me?
I may never write the book you want. I fear I can’t because it’s not the right book. It’s not the book that drives me. It’s not the real story inside of me, the one I keep hiding under other stories. But don’t despair. It may only be a bridge away.