Listen to Jim: http://jimreedbooks.com/mp3/howisthatrealitythingworking.mp3
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“Doctor says to the patient, ‘You’re going to live to be eighty.’ Patient says, ‘I am eighty.’ Doctor says, ‘What did I tell you.?’” –Henny Youngman
Henny knew as well as you and I know, that reality—real reality—can be jolting. That’s why he kept on telling jokes and whistling past the graveyard.
That’s why we spend so much time distracting ourselves—facing stark reality 24/7 will wear you down and out.
One way we writers distract ourselves is by…writing. Yep, as long as my fingers are dancing the light fantastic on the keyboard, I am distracted and happy. Based on this slender metaphor, might that mean that prolific writers and other busy artists are among the least happy folks on the planet? To keep their mood elevated they stay busy, reporting about the real world and their imagined worlds.
A few prolific writers come to mind—there are many more: H.G. Wells, whose creative output was more than that of Charles Dickens and William Shakespeare combined; E. Phillips Oppenheim, who wrote, at last count, 188 novels; Marilyn Ross (a pseudonym), who penned more than 400 books; Ned Buntline, who wrote about that many; Ray Bradbury, who wrote more than 700 stories; Isaac Asimov—didn’t he surpass the 500 mark? And so on. You can google these folks and correct me at will. I just recall these figures from pre-google days.
How do we deflect reality?
I can only speak with authenticity about myself—after all, this message is all about me, isn’t it?
Here’s a random note I found in one of my diaries:
It’s all about me. But, then, me is you—and you and you and you. I can’t know what’s in your heart but, as I wish to touch your heart, I try to show what’s in my heart, assuming that once in a while your heart will feel something familiar, something empathic, and we can nod familiarly at each other, knowing that we both at times feel and share the same thing.
Imagination and distraction are necessary now and then, to fend off the harshness of living.
While everyone else is dancing fast to avoid the snarkies, we lone Creators get to remain calm. It’s so easy to be alone in a crowd. Nobody notices. The Invisible Artist can get away with things! Things like loving people without having to engage with them too much, things like taking improper ideas and making them into works of art—wouldn’t Stephen King be in prison if he had acted out his stories in real life? Wouldn’t Salvador Dali have been institutionalized if he had gone around melting down clocks?
Oh, well, just a coupla thoughts to share before I head back to my Den of Creativity, where I can write anything I dang well please and not even share it if I don’t dang well please
© 2013 A.D. by Jim Reed