This is not a coat rack.1
But it is, isn’t it? It’s supposed to be my easel, but right now I use it to hold a couple of jackets. Ergo, it’s a coat rack. It’s never going to be an easel until I use it to hold a canvas. By applying this level of honesty to the other objects lying around my house, here’s what I’ve come up with:
- Electric guitar and amplifier - Remnants of my time with a band in high school, currently hogger of valuable cabinet space.
- Baseball bat - Object that gives me fake courage and confidence to ward off burglars when I’m alone at night. (Not guaranteed to fight off actual burglars.)
- Old analog v8 video camera - Also hogger of space.
Now, applying this to myself: I am not a painter. Unless I’m actually painting every single day, making it my work, then I am not a painter. I’m just some hobbyist who paints if/when time/money/desire allows it. I know this, that’s why I never call myself a painter.2 I do call myself a cartoonist because I doodle almost every day and most of my doodles are cartoons or comics. Also, with full confidence, I can tell you I’m a writer.
Many people find labels limiting, but I actually take comfort in them. They remind me of who I am. At the same time, though, I don’t grab a label I like and call myself that. It works the other way around. I go about my day doing the things I want to do. At the end of the day I look at what I’ve spent my time and energy on and that’s who I am. That’s what I do. Almost every time, the answer is the same - it’s writing. Drawing cartoons comes a close second.3
I am a writer. I also draw cartoons.
But surely labeling yourself is superficial… we are not our jobs!
If we’re not what we do, what we think, and what we say, then who are we? These labels are not imposed limits, they merely reflect what you’re already doing. Owning up to that and trying to compare what we think we do to what we actually do helps get rid of the delusions.
How many people say things like “I’m not really an accountant.4 That’s just my day job. My real passion is writing.” Out of those people how many of them actually spend time on their “real passion”? If you spend 10 hours a day doing accounting work, and 15 minutes facing a blank screen because of your “writer’s block”, then you’re really just an accountant with delusions of writing. If you want to be a writer, write goddammit.
Yes, I’m being harsh. But in case you haven’t noticed (the number of comments are a hint), this blog is really just me talking to myself. I have to keep myself in check and own up to what I spend my time on, own up to who I really am.
I am a writer. I also draw cartoons.
Thank goodness for that. Now, to fine-tune this a bit, I’d like to add the word “fiction” before the word “writer”. And there’s only one way to do that without deluding myself.
Write more fiction.
- With apologies to Réne Magritte.
- In some cultures, a painter is someone who paints houses and the like. If that’s the case then I am a painter once in a while.
- I didn’t know this yet when I wrote this post. Now that I’m more ruthless with cutting out procrastination, the truth emerges.
- With apologies to accountants who love their job.
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on Oct 23rd, 2009 at 6:40 pm
A label is useful.
Like any word it let’s you conceptualise or communicate something time-efficiently (I’m an economist ;)).
To continue our conversation I asked a fellow traveler what it was he did in paris. He was ‘an auditor.. a compliance auditor’ … Thank god he had a label. Instead of him struggling to explain each task in his day I could instead ask on about his travels (where our interests were more in common -and following Celine’s example no offense to compliance auditors, we all have different interests).
Celine I’m not completely on your side here:
“If you want to be a writer, write goddammit.”
Sorry to stir the pot, but if the person your talking to really wants to be “writing” at that very moment then why isn’t she already?
And if today she wants to be “writing” to just keep calling herself a “writer” then your art is parading itself or ‘art for art’s sake.’
Perhaps move away from the existential crisis towards asking:
In this part/chapter/sentence What do I want my reader to understand or feel? How do I make them understand or feel it?
on Oct 23rd, 2009 at 8:02 pm
“Sorry to stir the pot, but if the person your talking to really wants to be “writing” at that very moment then why isn’t she already?”
What you just said reminded me of this little tidbit from Merlin Mann. And I think it’s true. Lately, though, I’ve been having some conversations with a few friends, and I find that some of them seem to be “in between” (which is the state I’m referring to in the sentence you quoted). They say they want to write, sculpt, or become a competitive eater but “just can’t seem to find the time/energy/money to do it”. They may have books on the field they want to get into, but if they’re lucky enough to read them, they don’t necessarily act. They don’t seem to be at that level where they realize that if they’re not going to do it now, when are they going to? And the way one answers that question is what defines whether the writing/sculpting/competitive eating materializes or not.
I know that kind of sounds elementary since you’re beyond that, but for some reason many people haven’t figured that out. It’s like there’s always that abstract “someday” floating around and they’ll just wait until/if they get there. But in the meantime, they’ll label themselves “writer/sculptor/competitive eater” for comfort which really prevents one from owning up to reality.
“And if today she wants to be “writing” to just keep calling herself a “writer” then your art is parading itself or ‘art for art’s sake.’”
Maybe this is familiarity blindness talking, but can people actually do that? Writing is hard, I don’t know if people can actually do it just for the reason of calling themselves a writer. Personally, I do it because I can’t imagine not doing it. It’s probably the only thing I can stomach doing with my waking hours (necessities like eating and drinking not counted).
But to take your point less literally, what I was trying to say was the converse of “write so you can call yourself a writer”. It’s more like “don’t call yourself a writer if you don’t write, call yourself whatever it is you do most of the time”.
In my case, I’m not going to call myself a fictionist until I’ve spent considerable hours writing fiction. Although my novel is progressing consistently, it’s still not finished (in my book, it’s technically not a novel unless it’s finished).
But mainly what drew me to writing fiction again was the 3-4 day break I had early this month, where I did nothing else but write one short story (which I ended up submitting to an anthology). I didn’t even plan to do it, it just happened. I think I’d like that again, even if all I get in return are rejection letters. Not so I can call myself a fictionist but because, well, I loved it. I’m just going to avoid the trap of calling myself something I’m not, otherwise I might believe the label and forget the actual work.
on Jan 11th, 2010 at 1:16 pm
So if I only pause to defecate I still am not a painter? I find fault with your logic. I AM A PAINTER. Its not my job so that makes me NOT a COMMERCIAL ARTIST.
I grow weary.
on Jan 11th, 2010 at 8:26 pm
Johnny, the important point I was making was that I have to clock in the hours to write/paint, otherwise I’m not really a writer/painter because no prose/paintings are being made by me. It doesn’t matter if I have a job selling movie tickets out of necessity, as long as I’m taking the time to actually work on my stuff.
on Mar 22nd, 2010 at 11:02 pm
Hey Celine,
I’m totally with you on this. For years I didn’t dare call myself a writer because, even if it’s something I’ve always prepared for and longed to be doing, I wasn’t really writing. And sometimes, even when I was already writing, I just tell people that I “write for a living” because, personally, I feel I still haven’t entirely passed what for me are the qualifications for being a writer. Denotatively, a writer is someone who writes — we all can agree on that. However, the word “writer” is a term that is rich in emotive meaning. It connotes a lot of hard work, trial and error, creativity, imagination, resourcefulness, a constant push towards excellence. Maybe this isn’t the next person’s idea of being a writer is, but it is mine, and that explains why I approach the label ‘writer’ with apprehension and respect. It is, for me, a prize to be won.
I share your view that if one wants to write, then one should stop talking about wanting to write and just write goddamit!. I wrote something about this 2 years ago, when I struggled to get back to writing and finding my voice again after years of mind-numbing work in other fields:
I have nothing against labels — labels are just tools, neither good nor bad, and like any tool, depends on the hand or mind that wields it whether it is going to be an instrument of good or bad. When someone sticks on the label ‘writer’ or ‘artist’ or ‘doctor’ or whatever with nothing to back it up, well that’s called deception — of oneself and of others.
Cheers.
on Mar 23rd, 2010 at 1:15 pm
You’re absolutely right that the meaning of labels depends on the one doing the labeling. That’s something I should’ve pointed out. Like you, for years I struggled with words like “writer” and “artist” because of the implied value judgment of your work. Especially with the word “artist” because “art” tends to be more loaded than say, “story” or “book”. The latter terms are nouns, while “art” is used by some as a kind of adjective (”That’s art!” or “That’s not art!”)
So I kind of made peace with it by seeing “writer” and “artist” as a descriptions of process and behavior rather than my output per se. This helped me focus on the doing rather than criticizing myself for how I’m never as good as I want to be. It’s not perfect, but it’s eased the pressure a bit.
I love that quote, by the way
Thanks for linking to your article, I enjoyed reading it. You wrote about several points that I was thinking about when I was writing this post.