Whither We Write
A Meditation on Place
Before me there are trees with leaves all different hues. There is so much green, and hints of brown, red, and yellow, with blue among the bush. A blanket of clouds calms the day and allows the shades to be drawn up, revealing the full view even this early in the day when otherwise the sun would be too blindingly bright. I sit in the corner of my library, a three-quarter thrust of windows around me instead of walls. The temperature within is a perfectly comfortable sort of cool refreshing warmth, and the whole place smells of sweet cleanliness and old books.
This is where, of late, I come to write. The brightness is expansive and allows for the free flow of thought, and the sound is subtle; simple footsteps, page turns, and whispers. Other days it is loud and full of children screaming for a beloved presenting storyteller, and that is important too. Would I prefer there were a separate theatrical hall which could hold the screams away from my corner? Yes, I suppose, but being that the library belongs to us all, I simply sigh, smile, and then ignore them through the aid of private music in my ears.
Today, however, there is no need for such measures. Today, it is perfect.
It is curious to me that I find it so difficult to write in my own home. I suppose it might be simpler if I had more space to wander and wonder within, perhaps more than a single room, perhaps one dedicated to writing, or at least some more natural light. Regardless, it makes me wonder about the privileges it requires to dedicate one’s life to writing. The time alone is hard to come by.
In my life, I stand now at a curiously difficult and yet advantages crossroad. I am young enough and fortunate enough to be able to live on family property with only my own personal necessities as current financial obligations, but I imagine the place that would be ideal for me to live and write in - even a modest idea of it - and it is not something my current meager employment could support. The thought then follows that I should find full-time work, but then what type of life would I be living? I’ve learned of myself that I can’t seem to get my creative work done in small increments crammed into an otherwise busy day. With a full-time job, my writing would get pushed so far to the sidelines, I’m not sure I’d see it much at all. What good is living in my ideal writing home if in order to maintain it I have to live in such a way that I don’t have time to write?
I am not asking for answers, I only want to offer my situation as a curious self-aware case study. More urgently, I think of those who have no such opportunity to sit at a crossroad and choose a path. This world so often forces folks into paths they never meant to choose, and perhaps never wanted, but during their travels they never see a fork in the road permitting them to change course. This is a larger issue that goes far beyond artists, but I believe artists are perhaps the most painful societal sacrifice that this system makes.
So much of the art world now is concerned with telling the untold stories, but what are we doing to change the inherent reasons so many stories go untold? It’s one thing for an individual artist to trade a comfortable life for the ability to make their art, but it’s quite another to ask anyone to make such a sacrifice, and yet that’s exactly what the world does. It says, if you want to be an artist, sacrifice yourself and your every obligation and then maybe we’ll listen. Imagine what wisdom our world is failing to hear simply because it doesn’t respect the service done by those who tell it. We devote years of education to language and arts but we focus so much on the past and so little on the future.
Where will our next writers come from?
Where will they write?
Thank you for reading. Interested in more of my work? My primary project is the serialized novel The Legend of Leanna Page with Cedar Flyte. New chapters are released every week. Please go check it out and subscribe to keep up with the story.
Addam, I really appreciated you shedding light on the paradoxical struggle so many of us creatives face in finding the ideal space to nurture our artistic pursuits. Your insights inspired me to write an article on my Substack exploring how we can use vibrational energy work to transcend the illusion of lack and limitation.
Rather than resigning yourself to an uninspiring environment or sacrificing your passions, I encourage all of us to visualize and embody the nurturing creative sanctuary we deserve. Keep your focus firmly anchored in that abundant vision - the Universe will reorganize and deliver reflecting experiences to match your resonance. You've got talent and you've got this! Keep your energy shining.⭐😎🎉
In Wind, Sand And Stars, by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, and my favorite book btw, he writes about walking through a train full of laborers sleeping on the floor:
“I sat down face to face with one couple. Between the man and the woman a child had hollowed himself out a place and fallen asleep. He turned in his slumber, and in the dim lamplight I saw his face. What an adorable face! A golden fruit had been born of these two peasants. Forth from this sluggish scum had sprung this miracle of delight and grace.
I bent over the smooth brow, over those mildly pouting lips, and I said to myself: This is a musician’s face. This is the child Mozart. This is a life full of beautiful promise. Little princes in legends are not different from this. Protected, sheltered, cultivated, what could not this child become?
When by mutation a new rose is born in a garden, all the gardeners rejoice. They isolate the rose, tend it, foster it. But there is no gardener for men. This little Mozart will be shaped like the rest by the common stamping machine. This little Mozart will love shoddy music in the stench of night dives. This little Mozart is condemned.”
We lose many artists through the drudgery of life that few have the means to escape. Weep for the lost Mozarts, but rejoice for the artists who carve out time to create art.