A Persistent Illusion

My first day in Edinburgh and already 3 rare sightings:

1) saw my first gay Scot

2) first ginger with down syndrome

3) world’s smallest escalator (there were only 8 steps to it…apparently scots are lazier than americans)

i feel so worldly…

Day one. Not really. Let’s call it day X. An indefinite point on the timeline of delirium, but a starting point nonetheless.

That’s the opening line of a short story I wrote about a man trying to save himself from his own psyche. three weeks in seclusion without sleep and he tries desperately to pierce the haze and impose some order to his thoughts.

i’ve always been hesitant to put down my own thoughts — i think most likely because new experiences are constantly shedding new light on old circumstances. i enjoy experiencing the ideas as they grow and transform in my mind. but in terms of my own conception of self, as the present pulls my narrative thread ever forward it gets difficult to hold all those thoughts in my head and i need to get them out. that’s my thought at present, that by writing them down i can safely consign them to my past.

in reality, i began cataloguing these thoughts years ago. only i never felt comfortable identifying them as mine. i adapted them to fiction, translated them to the “other” by ascribing characters in my writing with traits from my own personality. i’ve never quite understood how my disparate interests cohere, so maybe this was my way of compartmentalizing. i was afraid if i wrote them down honestly, the center would not hold. i learned to revel in the obscurity — not that my identity was not present in them, but i liked that the inspiration’s source was a mystery to me.

in tracing this habit to its source, i realize that i’ve always waited to write down ideas for new creative projects, be it a script, story, or something else. i recognize the idea but then release it, letting it breach the surface of consciousness whenever it may over the next few weeks or months in random associations. it eventually comes to a point when i know it is ready to take tangible form. the problem is, years of practicing this method has enthralled me with the fluidity of thought.

these thoughts cant be private anymore. fluidity has to give way to discipline at some point, and publishing them seems as good a way as any to start reordering the delirium. i’m not sure that embarking on travels through europe is the ideal time to make such a decision, but i promised myself that i’d journal the last time i was in europe and it didn’t happen. in my head i constructed a timeline of events as i was experiencing them, creating arcs and to match my insights about myself and my personal relationships. i bought a journal in italy. i spent a month in france, then a month all over the place. then i got home. the journal had 2 pages filled out, the opening to a novel i’d conceived years before and allowed the proper gestation time. it was a start, but a start down the opposite path that i set out to explore. i put a big X through the third page and at the top of the fourth wrote: “My Summer in Europe: A Journey in 5 Parts”. each part had a corresponding personal revelation. i wrote two pages of the first part, then never returned to it. the narrative throughline still plays in my head, giving rise to unexpected “what ifs” at seemingly random moments.

this is my means of redemption, to trace the growth that brought me to this point. maybe in cataloguing my journey, i can create a structure that holds at the center. or maybe it will just be a jumbled assortment of thoughts - not necessarily epiphanic, but at least they will be mine…