042 ☼ how it looks vs. how it feels

more notes on writing

From an image series I’ve collected for a handful of years featuring shots from Huell Howser episodes where he’s touching things on screen.

I was speaking with a friend this weekend and she mentioned that from where she sits it looks like I’m very successful so she was shocked to hear that I was crying every day, struggling to pay rent and to eat and that I was generally having a tough lonely time. Writing is really lonely. I struggle to care for myself for various reasons across a spectrum of mental health, general broke-ness, feeling isolated, etc.

I also live on my own and haven't had a partner or dated anyone seriously in years. I feel old in the sense that I’ve been contending with time and struggling against internalized misogyny about my value as a ~ feminized subject ~ (aka, a woman under patriarchy). I asked another friend who is a painter if she questions why she's a painter, and if she asks herself if the world needs her to paint and she said, “Every day, baby.” So though I feel alone, I know for a fact, I am not.

I've been working on a book proposal for four years. It's embarrassing, but sometimes books just take that long nonfiction is difficult to organize and when I'm not writing for money or panicking or taking extra classes to earn skills, I'm staring at a document that I've written three or four times, sifting through sentences that no longer make sense to me since I've let them sit so long and wondering if I'm ever gonna finish this thing and move onto the next phase of my career. And what’s the point of a career if I can’t even support myself?