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Where Language Can’t Reach
I would give pretty much anything for a decent night of dreamless sleep right now. I’ve stayed up—am staying up—this late, fighting off the accumulated sleep deprivation of five days and two crises, for a phone call I’m pretty sure will not come before morning. And, for lack of anything better to do, I find myself contemplating the continued silence in this space and trying, however lamely, to fill it. Because if nothing else, I like solutions and I like closure, and posting here helps exert some control in a life where the problems are too overwhelming and open-ended to solve.
Discourse:Is there some reason you haven’t been blogging lately?
Elenita: Life sucks.
Discourse: That hasn’t exactly stopped you from doing stuff before.
Elenita: Doing and writing aren’t the same.”
Discourse: For you.
Elenita: Yes, for me.
The truth is, I don’t write well—I don’t share well—when things are going badly; I’m not the sort of person who can write in a fit of depression, even after a bottle or two of wine. I sometimes even envy those who can; as someone who loves words, doing so seems less painful than folding in upon oneself and withdrawing to a place where language can’t reach.
Because the latter—that’s what I do. Oh, I don’t disappear completely; the groceries are still bought, the phone calls are answered and returned, and if you didn’t know me well you might not even notice the difference. Hell, there have been cases where I’ve channeled my anger and frustration into my classes making it possible for me to ace tests and plow through reading assignments. But, the jokes and the playfulness, the animated conversations and the spontaneity, the creativity and joy—they usually stop dead. And the writer’s block, it springs up as a convenient guard while I submerge in my anger and frustration and sadness and retreat into a space where nothing can touch.
It is perhaps a selfish way to grieve and heal, but it is the only way I know.
For those of you following the home game, thank you for sticking in here and continuing to visit, read, and write. I don’t know when this will end—I don’t, in fact, know how to define an end to these situations in the first place—but I hope it happens soon. If nothing else, I need the sleep.
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