A true confession of one writer’s life, in perspective to date

If we’re counting from the time I got hooked on what became a journalism career, I’ve pursued a writing life for six decades now.

It began with hope, of course, including the dreams of glorious success and celebrity. You know, prizes and bestsellers and fame plus fabulous romance, family, and social life all reflecting intellectual brilliance. These were all wrapped up in the dream of a teen and beyond.

The reality, as you’re probably already about to pipe up, is that the practice of writing – whether literature or any of its other forms, including newspapers – is ultimately grubby work with none of those high-life perks for most of its faithful ranks.

That side’s not any different from all the fine pianists in our communities who never solo in public, despite their talent and passion, or the athletes who exercise daily and play unpaid in the parks on weekends, or a minister’s lifetime of well-crafted, scholarly Sunday sermons. The list of examples can go on and on. Practice, as I’ve come to embrace, is essential in many life activities, even in medicine and law. Forget the results, just do it.

While daily journalism paid my bills for most of my adult life, I was shunted to the editing side of the field, sharpening the prose of other reporters and correspondents and crafting headlines to capture the essence of their dispatches for a parade of readers rather than appearing under my own byline. Spare me the liberal elite label of the rabid right, please; real journalists, unlike the folks at Fox, put their leanings aside before touching anything. Facts are facts, which I see as important in fiction and poetry, too. Well, let’s not rule out their role in anything smacking of rationale behavior.

As far as my own writing pursuits went, I engaged in my free time in what I consider “the real stuff” – poems, fiction, work somewhere in between – much of it getting published in underground literary periodicals around the globe. It was enough to sustain me in the larger quest, no matter that the big successes kept eluding me, despite some near misses.

So here we are, at the beginning of another new year and a birthday soon to follow, and I have to admit the impact of aging, this time from the perspective of a writer. Narrow that to novelist, poet, blogger, and Quaker. One who finds there are still too many piles of drafted material remaining in the way to wherever comes after.

While I don’t have a new major writing project on the horizon – especially no new novel – I am feeling drawn to see what might still have energy in some of the drafts I’ve done in support of my earlier literary projects. There may be some fresh lessons to be gleaned or perhaps even wisdom in the light of time. It’s even an opportunity to reflect on a writing life.

An important elder for me has been the poet Gary Snyder, usually at a distance. This time, it’s from his Zen perspective of reaching an advanced age, almost a generation ahead of me:

My wife is gone, my girl is gone,
my books are loaned, my clothes
are worn, I gave away a car; and
all that happened years ago.
Mind & matter, love & space
are frail as foam on beer.

So for now, I’ll be going through the piles and clearing them away – before someone else has to. Yes, sort through the debris and move on.

It’s one more step in the practice of writing, something like daily prayer, something that needs to be done even if it seems nobody’s listening.

Now, let’s see where it leads.