thank you for taking the time to read my blog. it is a strange thing to write to nobody and pretend that they are somebody.
(if somebody happens to read this, I hope they don’t take this to mean I think THEY are a nobody; nay, quite the contrary. at this point in young Fia’s life, there is nobody reading these words, except she herself (which, last time I checked, doesn’t count), and perhaps a lonely spider on the wall, which doesn’t count either, because. duh. spiders can’t read).
so, why write?
Once upon a time, a wizened old man who had been through far too much trouble and horror and sorrow than any human should have to go through was asked the same question.
He answered it in many ways, but chiefly this:
“….if memory grew hollow, empty of substance, what would happen to all we had accumulated along the way? “Remember”, said the father to his son, and the son to his friend. Gather the names, the faces, the tears….”If, by some miracle, I emerge alive, I will devote my life to testifying on behalf of those whose shadow will fall on mine forever and ever.” 1
We write to capture. To document. To remember.
but is this all?
why do I write?
Perhaps because I must. Perhaps, because, just like Eric Liddell who couldn’t help but run, I can’t help but write. perhaps because, when I write, I feel God’s pleasure.
Is my writing any good? (if anybody reads this, it is for that one to decide on their own)
But in a way, I do not write just for YOU. Just as Eric Liddell didn’t necessarily run for others.
Eric ran for the Audience of One.
A bird sings, even if there is no one to listen, because it just can’t help but sing.
I write, because even if the world scoffs, ignores and calls my bumbling works as fit only for the literary graveyard, I must still write.
Even if no one were to read, I must still write. I don’t know if I have a gift in writing – perhaps not. (and I dare not compare my writing to the gift Eric had in running – time will tell if anything I write is worth reading or knowing).
But I write because, as long as God gives me words, thoughts, and ideas….I want them to be mosaics. Pieces of light that are intertwined and fitted together through letters to speak of something greater than myself.
I also write, because (get ready for a good laugh) I am afraid to write.
Yes, this is true. I have been afraid to write, because I have been afraid of the mind of the reader; what they would think. What they may think if the correct comma was not inserted, or if my poetry stumbles poorly, like a young child just learning to walk.
I was also afraid of who would read. (I’ll just leave it at that, because I know who you are, O person(s) who I am afraid will read).
I love to write, yet I am afraid to. So, I must do it. Because I must do the thing that I am most afraid to do.
….the old man mentioned above also said of writing:
“Write only if you cannot live without writing. Write only what you alone can write.” 2
I, Fia, am still figuring out what I alone can write. I know I haven’t figured it out. And perhaps I shall never. But hopefully one day I will look back and be grateful that I even tried. That I attempted (however feeble my attempts were) to grasp at those mosaics, those sunbeams of light and memories and thoughts and ideas and words and journal them.
{footnotes: 1. quote by Elie Wiesel 2. quote by Elie Wiesel}
The Silent Storyteller 