New Low

Well, I outdid myself today.  Not only did my second submitted draft manage to insult the writing sensibilities of almost all of my classmates, it got the guest panelist so mad that, had she channeled her mentor, the venerable Francisco Arcellana, not only would my draft have been torn up and burned right there, I would have been run out of the classroom.  Even my professor was pissed, so much so that I got a ‘no comment’.  From her, that’s very bad.

Although I explained that it was never my intent to piss everyone off (in situations like this, I just hate Death of the Author), in the end it just sounded like I was making excuses for myself.  I’m an awkward and clumsy writer, I admit it, but that doesn’t excuse the travesty I unleashed upon everyone.  I’ve experienced some bad spots in my (very short) academic writing career, but today was really an all-new low.  I mean, being mediocre is one thing, but antagonizing the people who I need help from…  I’m don’t know how to handle that.

Obviously I’m depressed.  Not surprisingly, I spent the next three hours wandering around the metropolis in an unfeeling daze. My mind literally went blank, that was how bad I felt. The next thing I knew, I was close to the Mall of Asia, which was getting filled by crowds of people wanting to watch the finale to the Pyro Olympics.  It’s a miracle that I somehow avoided getting in some kind of trouble during that time, but it brought me no comfort.  I mean, how would someone react to something like that?  I’m not even sure how to apologize or make up for it to my classmates and professor.  I just don’t know.

The most logical thing to do is to take everything that’s been said and start from scratch, but I’m still unsure.  Will the rewrite be any better?  What once was torn down can be built up again much more robust than before, but the construction still depends on the attitude of the builder, and at this point I’m not feeling all that great.

*sigh* I better shape up quickly though.  It’s the home stretch, and it’s imperative that I finish an acceptable rewrite.  Damn these eyes…  This is going to be an uphill struggle for me, and I’m not sure I’m going to be up to it.

Moments of Clarity

I rarely have vivid dreams.  Some of my friends tell me it’s because, for the most part, I do my dreaming while I’m wide awake.  I’ve lost count of the times where my office-mates told me of times where, despite of the workplace-related chaos that surrounded me, I seemed to have staring far away, at something in the horizon only I could see.  It bothered them at times, especially when I stop in the middle of a conversation, as if in a trance, or suddenly laugh out loud for no discernible reason.

I don’t blame them. That was what I was to them, always with my head partly or completely in the clouds.  The eternal dreamer, the child trapped in the body of this twenty-something who could not quite let go of her fantasies years later.

Oh, how wrong they were.  Mostly.

I’ve long accepted the fact that, during normal times, my mind is a cluttered mess.  It’s true.  I often have to struggle to get my thoughts into order.  It’s shameful, especially given the program I’m currently a part of.  If it’s not a maelstrom of confused images and ideas, it’s white noise.  Mental static, so to speak, a sibilant buzzing amongst a background devoid of creative impulses.  That’s what’s really happening when I stare out into space, looking the part of the thoughtful, dreamy, and mature office woman.

But this is not always so.  There are also instances of clarity, like those sudden cloud breaks that come in the wake of a storm, when the sun’s radiance bursts through the gloom to once more illuminate the moist earth below.  It is during these uncommon moments of clarity that ideas, really promising ideas so unlike those birthed through time-pressed, sleep-deprived, and stimulant-drink fueled sessions of frenzied work, burst into existence.

These moments don’t last long however, and often I’m left frustrated because, for all their promise, I’m not able to properly put them down into word.  It is during these times that I curse my clumsiness at wordcraft, as the images run their course, like an abundant stream filled with life, but a limited time to its flow.  No matter how hard I try to stop its course, the ideas just flow like quicksilver though my fingers, and I’m left with the echoes of ideas, ghost of possibilities never come to fruition.

It galls me, it galls me so.  But no matter how I rage at my own incompetence or simple impotence, the fact is the inspiration is gone.  Emptiness remains.

And you wonder why I’m so grumpy.

That said, I suppose those uncommon moments of creative clarity are much preferable to the alternative; I could have waking nightmares instead.

Plainness and Frustration

To say I’m frustrated is an understatement. Not only have I been staring at my computer screen for the good part of four hours now, and yet have been unable to write anything, but for some reason WordPress decided to eat the post I’ve been working on for the past fifteen minutes. *sigh* It’s enough to make one want to throw their hands in the air and say, “I give up!”

Were it only so easy. The second draft deadline coming up this week, remember. But today’s string of bad luck has drained me so much.  The headache I have isn’t helping matters too.

So I’m calling it a night, and just pray that tomorrow gives me the opportunity to make up for all the time I wasted today. It’s a hopeless wish, but it’s all I have going for me right now.