selfannedulgence (![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} annegst) wrote,@ 2008-07-16 22:45:00 |
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A Room of My Own
So I referred to this journaling workshop and something I wrote there. I want to move on and blog about my experience with a therapist. Yes, I've started seeing a therapist again. I think that's a healthy decision and something that I need to do. I'm stuck and things are overwhelming. Everything is overwhelming. Things that shouldn't be just are. And that's because the One Major Overwhelming Thing is overflowing and leaking into other areas of my life rendering me useless there. But before I can write about that, I need to share this journal entry because I ended up sharing it with the therapist.
Ok. So this memoirist (is that what you call a writer of memoirs), Diana, who was a bit full of herself came to give a journaling workshop. She told us would-be-writers that we needed to find a safe place to write. She said we should imagine a place -- to go there in our minds (our "third eye"). She invoked Virginia Wolff's "a room of my own" concept and said that we could remember a place where we felt comfortable, productive. And that it could be some invented place "a magic forest" if that was where we needed to go. And then she asked us to write about it. Here is what I wrote:
It's a bit odd. The room I envisioned was my bedroom in Manitowoc. But then Diana said "a place where you felt productive." Uh... productive? Then I got stuck and didn't know where to go. The place I felt most comfie was there, I guess. But productive? Not really. She then said we could try to create the space but that wasn't working for me. I just wanted to be in that room. Probably 11 X 13, wooden floors with the light blue rug that went almost wall-to-wall -- probably 6 or 8" of wood bordered the rug. Two sides had slanted ceilings. Built-in shelves my father had put up for my collections of whatever. I think since leaving that room I have been fairly nomadic. A year in Venezuela, different dorm rooms, parents moved, student apartments, and even here in SB where I'm supposed to be a grown-up I still don't have any space. "A room of my own" was the task and to find it I had to go back 20 years. 20 years of gypsy living. 20 years without having a place where I really feel comfie? But how could I honestly say I was comfie back at 601 N. 4th St in Manitowoc? There I was an awkward teenager. Filled with doubt and angst. Uh... some things haven't changed, have they? It would be nice to feel at home somewhere.
And that is what I read out loud to the group after others read more romantic descriptions of lived-in living rooms, organized writer's studies, magical spaces... and I read this. Not a romantic description but a spewing of the annegst I feel. And people loved it. It was just so me.
So soon I will write on my therapist experiences. I did read this bit to him because I thought it summed up fairly well some of the tension I am experiencing, the source of some of the ennui. Yes, when he asked why I was there I did say "Oh, general ennui." It's a great word, ennui. It really says a lot.
So I referred to this journaling workshop and something I wrote there. I want to move on and blog about my experience with a therapist. Yes, I've started seeing a therapist again. I think that's a healthy decision and something that I need to do. I'm stuck and things are overwhelming. Everything is overwhelming. Things that shouldn't be just are. And that's because the One Major Overwhelming Thing is overflowing and leaking into other areas of my life rendering me useless there. But before I can write about that, I need to share this journal entry because I ended up sharing it with the therapist.
Ok. So this memoirist (is that what you call a writer of memoirs), Diana, who was a bit full of herself came to give a journaling workshop. She told us would-be-writers that we needed to find a safe place to write. She said we should imagine a place -- to go there in our minds (our "third eye"). She invoked Virginia Wolff's "a room of my own" concept and said that we could remember a place where we felt comfortable, productive. And that it could be some invented place "a magic forest" if that was where we needed to go. And then she asked us to write about it. Here is what I wrote:
It's a bit odd. The room I envisioned was my bedroom in Manitowoc. But then Diana said "a place where you felt productive." Uh... productive? Then I got stuck and didn't know where to go. The place I felt most comfie was there, I guess. But productive? Not really. She then said we could try to create the space but that wasn't working for me. I just wanted to be in that room. Probably 11 X 13, wooden floors with the light blue rug that went almost wall-to-wall -- probably 6 or 8" of wood bordered the rug. Two sides had slanted ceilings. Built-in shelves my father had put up for my collections of whatever. I think since leaving that room I have been fairly nomadic. A year in Venezuela, different dorm rooms, parents moved, student apartments, and even here in SB where I'm supposed to be a grown-up I still don't have any space. "A room of my own" was the task and to find it I had to go back 20 years. 20 years of gypsy living. 20 years without having a place where I really feel comfie? But how could I honestly say I was comfie back at 601 N. 4th St in Manitowoc? There I was an awkward teenager. Filled with doubt and angst. Uh... some things haven't changed, have they? It would be nice to feel at home somewhere.
And that is what I read out loud to the group after others read more romantic descriptions of lived-in living rooms, organized writer's studies, magical spaces... and I read this. Not a romantic description but a spewing of the annegst I feel. And people loved it. It was just so me.
So soon I will write on my therapist experiences. I did read this bit to him because I thought it summed up fairly well some of the tension I am experiencing, the source of some of the ennui. Yes, when he asked why I was there I did say "Oh, general ennui." It's a great word, ennui. It really says a lot.
