Is that Jiminy Cricket hollerin’ in my ear? Alas, my blog betrays me again.
My beloved “peanut gallery” wants to know more about my week, this past week when I supposedly didn’t drink. The fictional week that never really surfaced. Of course, this begs the question–why not? Where did this exercise in self-control go? It went the way of good intentions. It paved the way to….
Last night I discussed my boredom. Now boredom is a curious thing. Wikipedia claims: “Boredom is a state of mind in which one interprets one’s environment as dull, tedious, and lacking stimuli. There is an inherent anxiety in boredom; people will expend considerable effort to prevent or remedy it, yet in many circumstances it is accepted as an inevitable suffering to be endured….Time often seems to move more slowly to someone who experiences boredom; this results from the way in which the human mind measures the passage of time, combined with the infrequency of events perceived as notable.”
And as if that doesn’t persuade you, John Milton reminded us that a mind “…Can make a Heav’n of Hell, a Hell of Heaven”.
Now I mention these things simply to say that I have quite a mind. (One that I seem to be pickling.) It screams at me, it tickles my toes, and I spend so many meandering thoughts pacing with “inspiration”. Some nights it feels as though it can’t handle itself without some support. For that we have anxiety medication and something to drink. I haven’t always had a drink every evening, and I still don’t always indulge, but lately I don’t exactly make much of an effort not to.
And that is the context while the rest is habit. Work, home, couch, bed…I talk about this too much! Now I’m boring myself.
Perhaps it is frustration because I have such a serene vision of my life that isn’t yet: More focused writing and more adventurous exploring. Those stacks of books to read and that lump of belly to dissolve.
You want to know about my week without? It began today. So far not much else to report except that I haven’t had anything to drink and I finished my grades.
Me and Mr. Jones 
it’s winter.in chicago.in march, which meansyou’re in a rut.it’s natural.
The peanut gallery sends its upmost gratitude for your entry.We all seem to either stumble upon or else create our own prisons. It is the universal human experience which permeates in some sort every relationship im my life. I would also consider it much more significant than a rut, with all due respect to the optimist posted above. This famous inmate wrote of Reading Gaol:The vilest deeds like poison weeds Bloom well in prison-air:It is only what is good in Man That wastes and withers there:Pale Anguish keeps the heavy gate, And the Warder is DespairFor they starve the little frightened child Till it weeps both night and day:And they scourge the weak, and flog the fool, And gibe the old and grey,And some grow mad, and all grow bad,And none a word may say.Each narrow cell in which we dwell Is foul and dark latrine,And the fetid breath of living Death Chokes up each grated screen,And all, but Lust, is turned to dust In Humanity’s machine.It sounds like you have identified boredom as your prison form which you find temporary escapes. I would ask the same question as the above poet: What greater inspiration to create exists than suffering? Therefore, what could be worse for your art than artifical escape from your inspiration?
except…what if the prison is the type that snuffs out creativity? isn’t this what the literate types call a catch-22?
Of course our prisons snuff out creativity! Did the Putnamville State Farm wonderfully facilitate creative expression in its inmates? No- it was a noisy, putrid, gray, hole of sensory overload. Wilde’s final conclusion is that the prison experience (not the prison itself)is the energy base for the creation of art. In other words, without suffering of the artist, art is artifice. If our breath of fresh air from the prison comes in the way of simple distraction, we have wasted our suffering. I think, and I think Wilde would agree, that if that breath of fresh air is found in the creation of art ( and I would add any act of beauty- the service of other, the realization of truth), that suffering has been well worth it. You may certainly find other temporary escapes, but for mortal men they can add up to a lifetime. I admit Hemingway might disagree. But I ain’t Hemingway.
I have the perfect way to give up drinking!Get knocked up. c’est moi — I can’t log into my account right now