001. YOU'RE NOT A WRITER THOUGH...
reflections on identity
This is one of those ‘is it the beginning, or the end’ kind of posts. The inert signs of sanity or possibly an extension of a Bookstagrammer losing interest with Instagram perhaps? It was bound to happen right? I’ve been thinking a lot about social media and this idea of relevance- this sort of invisible cry to be seen or heard through this aura seemingly floating through the air governing screen time and day to day activities. The other night I found myself lying on the couch thinking of the possibilities of not having an online presence at all- that idea of completely wiping your footprint clean, not a trace, nada. But would I be able to cope? In all honesty? Perhaps not. It’s silly how sometimes as humans you rely on that little bit of gratification for your creative endeavors, hard work and side hustles - this is how I see The Lit List (my account on Instagram) and how I envision this substack. Some may ask the question of ‘Why now?’ and in some cases, begrudgingly, I’ve also received statements of ‘But, you’re not a writer’- to my demise, I can say indeed, professionally I am not, but emotionally, I am. I’m just a full-time beauty executive with a penchant for the thrift store/ vintage lover Kool-Aid. I’m like a three-year old struggling to understand the sequencing of rules that are inherent to language - what could possibly set me apart from the rest of humanity? What constitutes one’s identity as a writer?
I spent the fair part of my childhood years writing in diaries with a lock, only to find that they were the cheap kind that could be opened easily with a five-cent coin. Every page noting a particular moment in time, emotions partaking in a waltz similar to that of the body’s rhythms. Voices translated into flushed cheeks and amateur crushes on a page, single aspects of love’s lost and rigors of those I had a grudge against… oh the woes of teenage angst. Needless to say, the infamous Regina George Burn Book of 2004 opened its arms towards girls also fighting their inner demons. I simply reached for an outlet, another volume to heed my cries and childish daydreams. I seem to do this thing where I step into this world already formed, where I assume the written words of a novelist reborn, and for a single moment in time, I’m living it. I’m living in a future unbeknownst to the person I’ve simply exchanged a few words with. A memory shifting over time, creatively and naively well perceived. Dim in their clarity, primed for mutation. It’s these insensible perceptions and multiple plots in detail that mingle in my mind. This incessant need to create. To write. To remember. To self-promote.
As artists, we create just like we are part of that waltz - we are dancing in a world full of meanings that go far beyond the intellectual. Our intimacy with our own creations embed themselves in feelings of pride, love, pity, horror and redemption. The idea of text will forever live inside and outside of me. The words and spaces that I wish to create here, embody a sense of hope, for better or for worse. Over the past few years, I’ve written various essays that I found myself struggling to fit within the squares of Instagram and it wasn’t till the other week that I received a message about someone wanting to read my other works, that I was floored. My intimacy with my thoughts is a product of my experiences, shifting perspectives, and sometimes purely the workings of a human mind pushed towards the brink of overdrive. Scenes of love and hate- reminiscent of those sacred diary pages from youth. Every day seems to be an episode of love/hate - loving those early morning silences, hating the scorching sun on my face when I’m so aware that I’m not wearing sunscreen. Loving the arms of my boyfriend cuddling me from behind / hating soggy cereal. That word ‘hate’ - a cursory word full of aching compassion and emotional truths/ the frivolity of a teen suffering from fleeting moments of disappointment and ethereal passion. So no, I may not be an esteemed writer, but in these shifting screens of a shared unconsciousness, is a human ready to bloom.
So to you I say dear friends, thank you for reading and for coming along this creative journey - through the shouts and whispers of such prose, will emerge another side of what it means to be me. The girl living on the other side of the world, still daydreaming, still sharing memes and still turning that page into a lived in reality.
“turning that page into a lived in reality” such a beautiful end to a very relatable piece!