Why Don't I Write Every Day

Last week I presented at an NeMLA conference some of my poems from my upcoming memoir manuscript, Empress Dreams. But now I am considering a change in the book title to My Memoir is the Skeleton. As I prepared for my presentation, I realized that my manuscript is a complete mess. I have post-its everywhere indicating that this poem needs to be longer or that prose piece needs some copy editing. I have not taken the time to work on this manuscript daily, and I don't know why. 

For decades I have struggled with not having a writing routine. So at this point in my life, I have to say that not having a writing routine is my writing routine. I just do not feel any kind of contentment when I am writing or working on my writing (revising) or taking the time to put together a book of my work. Since I made the decision to go with self-publishing, I do find that I think more in terms of books and not in writing a single poem and sending it out to journals. And my books are the following: At The Pit Mouth (a chapbook length manuscript of poems about the Dawson, New Mexico mining disaster of 1913 where 263 miners were killed and 130 of them were Italian immigrants), Atterrando (my book of poetry that I self-published with Epigraph Publishing), Abramo e Agata (book-length manuscript of poetry focusing on the Italian P.O.Ws in Lordsburg, NM during WW II), and my memoir (book-length manuscript of mixed genres--poetry and prose). Except for Atterrando, all my other manuscripts are very much "works in progress"--in other words, I am not ready to send them out to publishers or to consider having Epigraph publish them for me. And they are all in various stages of neglect or a kind of cycle of me paying attention and then making a pile and leaving it there for months and months. I work on it for a few days and then I tell myself I will get back to it, but I don't, and the pile sits there, neglected, abused, dust floating on it and settling down. And what am I doing during all this time?

When I was in graduate school, I never missed a deadline for papers and for submitting my creative writing in workshop classes. I never submitted a paper late. I finally completed my dissertation despite having to work (high school teaching) full-time and being a single parent. I was doing more in my day to day life than most of my graduate school peers were doing. I had to work to pay my bills and raise my child. And there were other issues/problems, etc. along the way--what we call "life"--child custody/child support road blocks, the stress and the responsibilities of teaching full-time, the lack of support from family and so on, and so on. All and more just got in the way. I learned that if I was not a "student" facing a deadline, I just would let the work molder until all that was left were disconnected ideas and words here and there in piles.

When I would finally get to it, I felt lost as if I was reading work from a stranger. I had lost the thread, the road map I had held on to in my mind. I was not able to withdraw from the world every day into my writing studio and write all day and someone else would show up with tea and cookies or let me know that "lunch was ready." But here is the thing. Even when I have the time (like I do now in my life), I still do not take that time. Why? I still do not have any clear answer on that. 

I could say that growing up in an immigrant, working-class family, I learned that work was important, necessary, and everything else (including creativity) was not as valuable. In fact, no need to nurture or protect creativity at all. We have to put food on the table, pay the bills, and behave as responsible adults. I still think about the daily sacrifices both my mother and father did just so I could have food to eat and clothes to wear. Somehow, from when I was very young, I was connected to and really committed to creative work. But no one was there to encourage me, to send me off to some arts camp. Every creative act I did came from my own determination, my own belief that my life only mattered because of my creativity. So there I was wanting to be an actress, or a singer, or a writer, and off I went to college determined to spend my time around other creative people and I did that for years while I worked at jobs I hated, and struggled to even pay my bills every month. But I never stopped believing in my creative work. 

Graduate school almost broke me. Having to write an academic dissertation almost broke me. And yet I survived. I finally was able to read a novel for the joy of it (it was Poisonwood Bible) and I slowly went back to my creative writing. Teaching high school for so many years almost broke me. But I never gave up on my poetry. Once I was finally able to teach at a university, I was back to writing a great deal because I wanted tenure. Because with every publication I knew I was closer to becoming a tenured professor. I was that responsible "student" again meeting deadlines and respecting the demands of my job. I wrote poems and creative nonfiction and starting working on longer works--like my Dawson, New Mexico poems. 

And now that I am tenured and last year was promoted to full professor, I am drowning again. I don't have job pressures regarding getting my work published. It all has to come from within, and that is where I am at now with several neglected manuscripts and me moving the piles around and around like some kind of dance. I need to settle down and get to work. No one else can write what I want to write in my voice. I hear that from my ancestors . . . If not me, who will do it? All the voices will disappear. If I do not finish that poem about my mother and her sisters, no one else will write it. 

Now I am wandering around in the dark ocean, feeling my way around creatures, not able to see most of the time, and wondering if I will ever reach the surface. What images will be collaged, layer on layer, until something else emerges? What voices will take over and finally be given space and time for their stories? If not me, then who?

"I'm a mermaid! I can swim," she cried, "so the game's up." Her dress was torn across, and peace being established, she fetched a needle and thread and began to mend the tear.

"And now," she said, "be quiet and tell me about the world; tell me everything that's ever happened, and I'll tell you--let me see, what can I tell you?" . . .

                                                          Virginia Woolf, The Voyage Out