That Feeling In My Stomach

Wow. Just…. wow.

I have this feeling in my stomach. It’s a form of anxiety, I recognize the sensation, and it’s different from any of the many other kinds of pain I’m used to recognizing. But I’ve been lying in bed watching TV eps almost all day, and now it’s 2:00AM on Tuesday night (I don’t believe in midnights, it isn’t the next day until I sleep and wake up again, no matter what time that might happen, okay?)… so what’s with the anxiety?

It’s a need to write. I feel inspired, and it’s eating me from the inside. I wonder if this is the feeling that addict artists when they have a burning urge to create something but are so blocked, they have to get high to stop feeling like this. So often in my life, I have something to do, but no motivation to do it. Right now, I have a burning urge to create, but nothing to create from. My mind is all energy and no substance right now. I have nothing to say, and every burning urge in the world to say it.

I have a song in my head. I think it’s modern and popular, which is why I don’t know what it is. But I’m becoming slightly obsessed with it, even thinking of it in my head makes me feel like I want to cry. It’s a strange sensation.

Anyhow, with this crazy need to write, and nothing of substance to say, I cracked open this ol’ journal again – I guess that’s why people "blog", isn’t it? So they can vent such randomness that can’t be channeled into any more valuable format?

I’m floored by the notes. Quite seriously, utterly, floored. I don’t know the word for how I felt when I read them, and I’m a man with a fairly comprehensive vocabulary. "Thanks" doesn’t even come close to conveying my gratitude for the immediate shift in my mood before and after loading OD and reading your feedback on my last entry, but I hope that I can get to know each of you soon and, if I can retain your interest long enough, that it won’t be the last I hear from any of you.

Your notes got me thinking about what I’d said, about writing for the attention. In my particular case, I don’t think it’s as simple as being the choice between writing for myself, or writing to be read. When I think about it, everybody writes for their own reasons, whether they are or are not what they claim them to be. Some people say they write in their online journals solely for their own reasons and don’t care if anybody reads it or not, but in my case, it’s not choosing the opposite – it’s that for me, they’re one and the same thing. What I get out of writing, is the attention. While some might find the act of writing their thoughts down therapeutic, for me, the therapy lies in knowing that somebody’s read what I’ve written, and that for good or bad, I’ve changed somebody’s bad. I’m like a child that will throw it’s food on the floor if you don’t hug me – I’ve often been known to throw really controversial things out to the world as a challenge, if nobody will listen to my ordinary babble. It’s the old saying, there’s no such thing as negative press. Even bad attention is better than no attention. If you ignore me, I’ll just push your buttons until you yell at me. =)

So, the front page of the site, hmm? That’s another thing I like about OD over LiveJournal or similar – the very structure of the site allows people to stumble across you, you don’t have to hunt and beg and coerce people into reading you. The site puts you out there, and lets the like-minded come to you. I like that, a lot.

Jessica, I think I’ll talk more about my travels in a future entry. I have a tendency to go off on a tangent and never come back to my original point. Don’t want you to think I’m going to ignore the question though, but if I get into that story right now I could be writing until dawn. =P

Amethyst, you’re right, the similarities are more than a little creepy! I’ll bet more will crop up too as we both post more about ourselves and get to know oneanother. I’ll definitely be keeping an eye on your journal!

Stomach feels a little better, but only in the sense that I’m distracting myself from it. Like, you know when you feel really hungry, and you drink a lot of water and your stomach doesn’t have that dead starved pit feel to it anymore, but you still don’t feel satiated by food? That’s the best analogy that comes to mind. I don’t think writing on OD will ever truly stave off a feeling like this, but it will be better than lying on my bed, listening to the clock tick and wondering why I can’t create anything beautiful.

Urk, there we go, now I’ve dried up totally. I’ve been staring at that paragraph for 15 minutes, and getting distracted, flipping between windows, trying to hunt down the song I have in my head. And as a result, I’ve totally spaced on anything else I might have said here.

Anyway, let me just say again how utterly rapt I was at your notes – thank you so much for reading all that lengthy drivel, and caring enough to let me know you did! There’s hope for my continued presence at OD yet. =)

I’ll try to throw something a little more tangible your way when I’m in a better headspace – right now I seem to be far too ADHD to be of much use for anything! =P

I’ll be back…