Transition

There were times, during my publishing career, when people would ask me, "Do you write?"

I never considered myself a writer, and would never describe myself as such. But everyday, I wrote. The job, the work demanded it: editing to the point of rewrite (a craft in rare cases these days, to which I can attest, and any reasonable reader of today's bound volumes can discern), proposals, analyses, book descriptions, marketing and advertising rewrites, jacket flaps, back cover copy, catalog descriptions, and more.

Many in the corporate publishing world were fond of one-up-man-ship: Who could toss in the cleverest phrase in the midst of a list-planning meeting? Which terms were the vogue, once a director or chief executive uttered them - and all others followed suit, adopting the word or term and working it into a fawning response? Smarty-pants. How that irritated me. Words like chock-a-block, doppelganger, grotesquerie, and the most loathsome of all, metric.

Well, to be honest, I do like the word doppelganger.

I am reluctant to call myself a writer. And yet, just over three years ago, I began to write - for myself. It came to me like a possession. There were harbingers. I'd grown disillusioned with corporate life, corporate success. I found myself opening up to tracts and discourses on the nature of creativity and art.

And then, after a whirlwind weekend visit to a friend in Paris, it hit me. I wanted to write a story. Rather, the story appeared in my mind, and the sentences erupted, one after the other, in a torrent. I found that the hair on my forearms stood on end, that all I could think of was the story, that I would lose sleep for it, burst into strange tears over it.

If I included a reference to a place or a foreign language-term, I would obsess until I could research every aspect of it

Curious, it was similar to the first flush of falling in love - and there was no human love object, just this strange exhilaration. Well, maybe there was the desire to be in love, or a slight slip toward someone who was unavailable. Maybe it's something I'm afraid to admit - no point now. Grist for the larger mill.

I asked an artist friend of mine - a real artist, a painter, who makes his living as best he can doing that for which he has no choice (that much I do understand about artists). I described all of this to him. And to my slight astonishment, he laughed.

"I love that feeling," he added. "I hope it happens to me again soon. I haven't had it in a while."

I knew what he meant without responding. The energy is so powerful, overwhelming. It's as if you lose the power of choice. I understood.

And I've inhabited that place since.

I'm reading Colm Toibin's novel, The Master. The words, the stories so perfectly penned, underscore why I am edging on admitting (still a vestige of reluctance) that I am one of those people...who write.

Comments

[Robert Schott]

Holly,
last month I attempted a blow-your-mind-out-of-the-blue message to you through this channel. Either it never delivered or you got it and thought 'that was scary' . . .

Anyway, I google friends of my past once in awhile and I thought of you and here you are. Clearly now I know what you are up to!

In a nutshell, Erika and I have 3 rather together children, 15, 12, and 10. Boy, girl, girl. Sensitive. Driven. Butterfly. W're in a nice suburban home in Cranford, NJ.

I am forcing my family to bear with me (work intensity) as I work on an invention that is really, really close to being a big deal, and then I can quit my tiresome corporate day job that sucks the life out of me. See url.

'That feeling' you artists talk about, well, for the first time in my work life I am finding it with my invention projects. I too am driven to dig deep for everything I need to make this thing happen. And it is. We are about done making, selling,and deliverying - next step is to drum up some good P.R. for exposure.

It would be fun to chat one day.
Be well.
Robert
908-451-6290