People expect writers to be happy. We’ve chosen this life for no logical reason or material gain. It must make us happy. And it should—sometimes. But even the most passionate entrepreneur or dedicated director of a non-profit has aspects of the job that, well, suck. Days that are blah or disappointing, effort that seems to exceed the pay-off. It’s work.
Of course, the thing about work is that it pays you, has benefits, co-workers, health insurance. So people expect you to suck it up and carry on. Complain a bit, sure, but get up the next day and do it again.
Writing is not so dependable. It’s like that bad boyfriend, that troubling girlfriend that you wish your best friend would break up with once and for all. But the break-up sex is always too good, there’s something irresistible about the irresponsible person—your “friend” always goes back. Yeah—let’s face it, your “friend” is you, the writer who can’t live with it, can’t live without it.
It stands you up, lets you down and yet it shows you the best times you ever have, too, it makes your life meaningful. You forget yourself in the raw rhythms of sentences—sentences!—and you can’t stop.
My kids started kindergarten this month, and it’s been an adjustment. For them, too. J We moved upstate and searched high and low for a school we felt good about. It had to be academically dynamic and have, too, a big social-emotional component. The teachers had to be amazing, the parent community promising, the atmosphere one of joyful embracing of a two-mom family. Oh, and it had to be free.
Anyway—we found it. We moved. The school is a mile from our house. People praise the teacher like she’s a messiah, and the head of the school, too. It’s public.
And we’ve heard: I don’t want to go to this school next year; I’m bored; the day is too long . . .
At first I was beyond chagrined. As someone who dropped out of high school when I was a National Merit Scholarship semi-finalist, “boring” is a battle cry to me.
But then I remembered: we don’t have to be happy all the time. We don’t have to like every aspect of what we are doing for it to be important and beneficial. Let’s face it, my kids wouldn’t have made it to kindergarten if that were the case—I would have dropped out of parenting. But when something is important, we slug on through the hard stuff. We let the great moments, however fleeting, however sandwiched by terror, exhaustion and, well, boredom, serve as motivation to keep going. We weight them differently—putting a thumb on the scale of the good stuff and jabbing a rock under the scale for the bad stuff.
Happiness is lucky. Maybe it’s a choice. But at any rate, it’s not a constant state. Not in marriage, not in the perfect job, not in kindergarten and not in writing.
I wish my students, “Happy Writing,” and I mean it. But if the happy has to drop out sometimes, the writing can plug on until the happy resurfaces. And just “Writing!” can be enough.