Blogging from the Front Porch

First of all: ACKPHTHPTLTLBLOOBLOOOFFFFF.

Ah. Better.

It is nice having an office, but the downside of it is that I spend most of my time in a basement room with hardly any natural light. I feel more and more like a vampire (albeit one that wears a purple robe and foot duvets) when I trudge downstairs each morning with coffee in hand. The place was once a makeshift recording studio - cardboard coffeeholders still line the ceiling - but even the small amount of light afforded by the two tiny windows is not enough to keep it from feeling gloomy. And that gloom has apparently translated into an inability to turn out a proper blog for the first two weeks of the new year.
So here I am on the porch.

As far as portents go, 2009 has not shown any sign of being better or worse than '08 just yet. Which is to be expected, I suppose. Foolish shortcut-seeker that I am, I awoke on the morning of January 1st thinking I'd be able to shake off all of my mental baggage and simply plow ahead into my work; who needs hours and hours of practice when you have the magic on New Years Momentum working for you?
I am this way about a lot of things. Why?
It is perhaps helpful that 2009 has offered up so little thus far, therefore making it easier to quickly realize the naivete of my initial approach and so set it down. I remember thinking, on New Years Eve, how all the world seemed poised to Make A Go Of It in '09, and that all the collective positive energy would no doubt carry me along. How can a person entertain such a notion? Answer: because it is a nice alternative to having to shut up and do the work.
And yet, and yet. You know the drill.
I'm as good at anyone at finding creative reasons to put off doing my writing and drawing practice. But if 2009 has shown me anything thus far, it's that it isn't about to start making it any easier for me to beat the system.
That's the state of things, folks. Stop trying to make your workspace perfectly clean, forget trying to get all the stars to align in order to make your words more pure and concise. It won't work.
So to build upon my initial plan for this year, let me add this: There ain't no easy answer. Best stop trying to find one at all. Gets in the way of doing the ground work. It's on the ground that the guts are made. It's on the ground that the well is filled.
I've got a lot of work to do.
Better get to it before I just start talking.




A few helpful links:

Cory Doctorow - Writing in the Age of Distraction
gapingvoid on being creative
The Second Virtue of Writing
Craig Thompson on getting started