"On Keeping a Notebook"

I just read Joan Didion's "On Keeping a Notebook," courtesy of my friend Brigit's blog (that's brig + it, not bridge + it).

As a side note, Brigit is the original source of my nickname Schurl. I owe her for it. It has become my unique identifier. The one separated out from family history and background. It's me, as the person I have made of myself, not defined by where I come from.

Anywho, back to "On Keeping a Notebook." I read it, and while some moments were so distant to me that I was only skimming and not absorbing, other's hit like a brain freeze, forcing a strange sort of self reflection.

Reading what Didion wrote about why she keeps a notebook was like reading about myself. It made me feel like an ethereal poet. Somehow above this world and removed from it in an empowering spiritual way. It also made me feel hollow, removed -- hopeless. I will never be enough in touch with reality to be happy with the way things are. I'm in my own little world, both beautiful and empty, toggling back and forth between pride and self-dejection.

This all sounds very melancholy, but it's this toggling perspective that drives me to do something meaningful, yet hopefully keeps me humble after I accomplish things. It's not bad, just difficult.