he said, she said.

I've written before about my professor's letters of criticism to me. I also wrote about the last thing he wrote me. When he said I was passionate. When he said passion was my obsession. I am not even sure I know what passion means, but then again when you live inside something every day, you forget that it is there, that you are living it, that you are living as that. Whatever that may be for you. For him - or rather, what he saw in me, what he read through me - was that I want to write passion out of my body.

Well, I found something more today. I found some more of his words. Words where he defined the passionate person. 

"I think, maybeperhaps, passionate people have learned there is really nothing to lose. If you give up passion, you are punished twice over. You don't give yourself the chance at those highs, and your life spills like sand through your hands anyway. You are marched to the wall at the end, passionate or not. So why not go ahead and risk everything, because what are you risking? What is the worst thing that can happen?"

I am. I am willing to risk everything. My every word. My every secret. Anything I have. Anything you say I have that I should give. I'll give it. I'll give it if it will make us mean something more. When I was a young child, I remember being fascinated by the Boston Tea Party. I devoured history. It's why I began writing plays. Making a newspaper in Elementary School and selling it before class. I suppose, I knew early on this life is my one chance. There will be others. But I'll be someone else. Someone slightly different. Under other conditions. But right now, right here, as me, this is it. And back then I felt the same as now, I don't want to just be here and not leave a trace. Not be able to communicate what it is like, how it feels, what the concerns are. As a young child, my passion was to tell time. Tell time for those who wouldn't be able to imagine it, see it in their life. That's why I have my photographs. That's why I have ink. That's why I have this name. I want to use this name. I want to use myself. It could sound arrogant, egotistical, sure, but I began risking that too long ago. And I would never regret what I have written and which can't be erased, even if my feelings have changed. It was true at one time. It is what I felt. So yes, I could sound arrogant. But someone has to risk their Self. And I am willing, just as I am sure others are. Maybe even you. We can't live in a fear. We could go in an instant. I know no one wants to hear that, but then again, most people try to live quickly in order to avoid thinking of what is really going on. And what is really going on is that time is running. And it is out of our control. If there is one thing I can promise you is to not live in fear. I spent so much time fearing. I wasted so much of myself. Sometimes even writing can be time taken from living. But...? I wonder whether that teacher severed the romance out of my flesh. Somehow I have listened to him, even when I thought I shouldn't. He said not to write sex, that it couldn't be tasteful, that women couldn't do it. And so I committed myself to it. For the last six months. I let others come inside me. I risked what he advised to avoid. But it is the risks we need. And so, I bared whatever has come from it. Knowing that it is only one of many ways to try out my thought, to see where my words go. I suppose this an apology for all the relationships I write about it. There are other things. There is other lives I am living. Other discourse I am present and hearing about. Those things will come, too. I hope. I hope I will never stop learning about others. I hope I will only become a better listener. But back to the now. My passion sounds passive. I guess it is just the current reality I am trying to translate. Passive because it all seems so fleeting. I want to make it permanent, but we can't be. My writing can't capture you. It won't make you stay. But, maybe, just maybe, I hope, writing can touch you. I want us to feel like we know each other. Know what we want the other to know... if we didn't fear so much. Don't fear. It isn't worth it. Say it. Show it. Make someone stop and stay. Stop and stare. Otherwise, people will keep going, keep living the fast life. You know - I've said it - and I meant it; all I want right now is someone to lay down with, who will pause with me, even if it is only an hour of the day. Maybe I want someone to touch me because I feel like... all of this... is me giving myself, trying, trying trying to touch someone other, other than myself, so we can together make a difference. But a difference in what? Oh I don't even know anymore. I've been living this too long. And I will always. I will always be writing to reach you. 

"All artists must compete with the inventions of the 20th century: film, radio, television, amplification, jumpcuts, millisecond MTV attention spans. Some writers have responded to the cranked up volume by writing fictions that are like poems, their language distilled to diamonds - Hempel. Other writers respond by writing the quietest brick-like sentences ever written - Carver. 

I'm not saying all this noise is bad. I'm just saying it is. And it might be good. Because whenever there is more, more grist, more chaos, more more, there is more possibility of juxtaposition, for creating the new. 

So, in conclusion, what the hell am I saying? I don't know. Maybe, if you hope for a career in writing, or in any of the arts, see if you can get it jumpstarted before you start jumping a boy to make babies. See if you can get a book or two on the shelf, the nI think you might have a fighting chance. So, sure, make the babies, but, if possible, make them on purpose, not by accident, and in full understanding of the tradeoffs.

And the father in me speaking: If you aren't ready to sign that check, don't be imitating baby making without pill or condom or whatever. Sure, there are remedies, but abortions cost more than money, no what are your beliefs.

I wish there was something I could say, but I can only stand here, silent, watch you start off again on your walks."

I wish I could tell you, the admission's council, what I am doing. But I just don't know anymore. I can't even think about it. I'm just doing it. I've been doing it so long. And yes, I guess, no definitely, it is my obsession.