Identity

I thought I’d feel wise when I turned 40. Not that I’d get some magical dose of extra over-the-hill wisdom, just that I’d be at an age where I could share some life wisdom and be taken seriously.

It’s been a few years and all I know is more about what I don’t know. And in the last six months, since buying a house and being damned (temporarily) to a stationary life, I’ve realized how little I still know about myself.

This week I spent a significant amount of time longing for a life without close relationships. I don’t know where it came from. I’m not totally familiar with this part of me.

It’s not a healthy desire, I’ve seen the data. Close relationships with family and friends are key to happiness, and to health.

But I just kept day-dreaming about driving a van down the 101. Stopping at diners to write. Sleeping in the back of the van. Sitting on the beach, the cool salt air kissing my cheeks.

Just now, I envisioned it again, so that I could describe it here. Thinking about it brought tears to my eyes. What in the overdramatic-extra reaction was that?

Do I want it so bad I’m crying because I can’t have it? Do I feel bad for wanting to be alone? Am I sad because something’s probably wrong with me that I’m daydreaming about being a lonely old lady living in a van?

And have I entered into an unhealthy level of introspection?

Probably.

Definitely.

I’m writing this character who had a found-family and ran from it (with good reason). She doesn’t want anything to do with people anymore, not beyond the surface level anyway. And she’s content. She has a routine, a couple of things she likes to do (alone), and she’s good.

It’s a book, so obviously something happens and drags her unwittingly into an adventure where she will use her skills, do awesome things, and learn a little something about herself that she can use to save the day.

And along the way, there are a couple of moments that reinforce her conviction to be alone. They remind her how badly she’s been hurt, and how badly she hurt others— and epecially how badly she hurt others unintentionally when she was hurting.

To my character, it felt so bad to be around other people, the people who hurt her and the people she hurt, that being around no one felt good by comparison.

Maybe not the happiest, and maybe not the healthiest, but good.

Books always want to make this kind of character find family and/or friendship again.

My book is no different. It wants that in a bad way. It’ll probably get it too. In fact (and unrelated to this post), it’ll probably play a big role in the part of the story I’m writing next, the one I’m pretty blocked about, the reason I haven’t written a scene in over a week.

But what my book and all the other books don’t understand is that my character is fine. She is good without anyone right now. It’s like she’s in a little boat on a calm lake and, sure, she could be happier or more fulfilled if she took the boat into rougher waters, but why?

She’s had her fair share of near drownings and it’s pretty rude of the book to expect her to risk any more just to meet genre conventions and reader expectations. Jeez.

I think what I’m getting at is that authors should be nicer to their characters? Or maybe it’s that authors should be nicer to themselves?

Or maybe I should make sure my characters get what they need instead of what they want, so they don’t spend their limited number of days on this planet playing it safe.

It’s one of those. Probably the one that has me closing out of the Marketplace search for vans.

But what do I know? I’m only a few years past 40.

A million little deaths

My heart never stopped beating, my lungs never stopped breathing, but I died. I died many times.

I can count the deaths, the moments when the person I was ceased to exist, when she was replaced by someone new. Sometimes I liked the new girl more.

Sometimes I liked her less.

it’s just latin

"It's just latin."

This is my new favorite phrase.  I whisper it to myself as my mind spins out of control, threatening to coax me into some needless action.  I shout it at those random, errant thoughts - the ones who insist I’ve strayed from some mythical laid-out-for-everyone course, the ones who suggest I should conform to useless norms, the ones who want me to spend my time and life and energy on things which hold no value for me.

"It's just latin," I say to them.

I've had my nose in this amazing biography on Leonardo Da Vinci for more than a month and it has been perfectly timed reading for multiple reasons.  Today I'm thinking about just one.

"It's just latin."

Leonardo was the bastard son of a Notary.  Had he been legitimate, or legitimized, he would have been schooled - “educated” - but he wasn't.  He was "unlettered" (his words), which mostly meant he didn’t know latin.  The schooled kids were "lettered."  The schooled kids knew latin.  The schooled adults could read the books.  Latin was a big deal.

Until it wasn't.

By the time Leonardo was a young apprentice, Gutenberg's printing press made it to Italy and books began printing in Italian.  I'm not sure no access to books would have handicapped Leonardo much - he did not for the most part like to rely on other people's observation - but with the spread of printing he DID have access.  The thing which kept him from literacy, an inability to read latin, suddenly didn't matter.

It's just Latin.

Except it must have mattered to him, at least a little.  His journals betray his attempts to master Latin - word lists written out by a 30-something Leonardo - but don't state a reason for his efforts.  Maybe there was a book or books not yet printed in Italian to which he desired access, or maybe the language sparked his curiosity, but I think it was something different.  

Despite Latin being of little use to him, despite Latin being a terrible waste of time he could have spent doing more Leonardo-esque things, despite it being something he likely found difficult and boring (you can see his sketches among the word lists!), he still attempted to learn it.  He used up some of his time, his energy, his life on this thing and, most likely, he didn’t ever actually learn Latin.  

It didn't slow him down.  The man was centuries ahead of his time in multiple disciplines.  What use was Latin to Leonardo? None, really. So why did he study it?

I hope he doesn't mind my assumptions about his reasons. I hope he doesn't mind if I assume he confused the traditions and cultural constructs of others with truth, if I assume he forgot the path others expect isn't the one he must take, if I assume he was swayed a bit - even with all his eccentricity - toward conformity.  I only assume because it is true of me.

I sometimes confuse the assumptions of others with what I should do.  I sometimes forget the path others expect isn't the path God laid out for me.  I sometimes am swayed - even with all my eccentricity - toward conformity.  But if a genius like Leonardo could be confused occasionally, I won't be too hard on myself.

And when I realize I'm doing something, or contemplating something, which has no value to me, when the world is doing it's best to box me in, I'm going to not do the something.  The something doesn't fit in this one life.  The something doesn't get my time. The something doesn't get my energy.

It's just Latin.