October Diary Entries
October Diary Entries
Entry 1:
I am in a disheveled state these days. Books stacked and scattered on all surfaces of my room. Sticky notes that have lost their stick fall on my desk like autumn leaves. The flowers on my nightstand have wilted and are giving off a sour, perfumed odor. Pink petals faded to brown. The money tree is still alive and stretches its leaves toward the window, longing to be outside, but I have sentenced it to a life as a house plant––to stand its soil cell as decoration. Do you really work? Will you really bring me money? I am content here in my woman cave––my "Mojo Dojo Casa House" of books, blankets, and neglected water bottles. This is the place of fattened notebooks stained with the purpose to soothe and inspire me. They hold story ideas, secrets, forgotten phone numbers, and grocery lists. My mind is a disoriented mural of Mitski and existential dread, but the writing keeps me sane.
Entry 2:
I think my love language is bed. I can almost convince myself I am in love with a man if I'm in bed with him long enough. We don't do what most people would assume when the door is closed. We just talk and cuddle, and that's enough for me. I don't need him to take off his clothes. He just has to talk, call me sweet things, and hold me close. That's all I need. It's dangerously simple because if I am not careful, any man can have me.
Entry 3:
Sometimes I worry I love isolation too much. I am the type of person that works best when she is alone. I feel I am happier when I am alone, but I also crave the intimacy of having a romantic partner, more so in the emotional sense. I also want a family. Just as I feel I was meant to be a writer, I feel the call of motherhood thundering in my core. This image of domestic bliss is occasionally shadowed by my need to create. I frequently fantasize about running away to a bungalow or a cabin where I can hide and read and write and exist in silence. I then crave a different kind of intimacy––the warmth of books stacked around me. I crave nights sprinkled with stars as I lie on the grass, or on a hardwood floor as the fireplace crackles. It's easy to imagine my life this way. When I think about female authors: Donna Tartt, Virginia Woolf, Louisa May Alcott. None of them had children and only Woolf married. I think of Florence Welch, a singer and songwriter. She wrote a song about how people expected her to marry and have children, but in the end she sings, "I am no mother, I am no bride, I am king." What am I? I want to be a bride. I want to be a mother. I want to be a writer too. I know it's possible. Margaret Atwood married and had a child, so did Joan Didion. I think they both divorced though. So is it true what Atwood says about art? That there needs to be sacrifice? Is it too much to ask for the husband, the baby, and the books?