Losing My Voice

I always self-identified as one who writes (never bold or arrogant enough to actually call myself a writer).

In sixth and seventh grades, a friend and I wrote seven books together. It was one of the best memories of that time, trading the book back and forth and adding new sections for the other to react to. We regarded those books as sacred and they are still prized possessions. She will always be special because of those stories.

My closest college friends were a couple of writers, both far better than I. Thinking of them, I always see a dimly-lit room, an over-flowing ashtray, CDs spewed on the floor in front of a stereo, and three of us with our big black journals creating what we were sure was genius prose or poetry. While we had many adventures together and many stories to tell, I've lost most of those, left with that image of us which has burned into me, deeper than all others. It was the richest, most emotional writing phase of my life. We all moved away, moved on, and with their exit from my daily life, so too did my writing until it was little more than the occasional journal.


Then I met Tessa. Tessa is a wonderful writer and together we decided to start this blog, both as a means to keep up with our writing as well as something to do. Also, selfishly, I love her work and wanted her to write more. For over a year, we were mad bloggers. It was another wonderful period of writing for me and no matter how busy I was, I was still putting up blogs and writing other stories on the side. And then it started to wane.

Tessa moved to China. She couldn't access the site. Slowly, she stopped writing and then so did I. What had long been a fiery passion was waning down to embers.
I don't write. Or rather, I am not writing. And what does that mean for my sense of self, once so strongly linked to words, to writing, to creating? This was my state of mind when I started reading Lambert's "Digital Storytelling."  Reading about writing, about people being successful at writing, made me sad. Jealous. Perhaps even a bit angry. You see, I feel like part of me has gone numb and I'm waiting to see if the blood will flow back in or it it'll rot and fall off. Will I recognize gangrene when it sets in? Reading the book just reminded me of what I seem to be losing, have perhaps already lost.



And then I got to "The Story Circle." He describes the circle and its effect thusly,
"...when you gather people in a room, and listen, deeply listen, to what they are saying, and also, by example, encourage others to listen, magic happens" (2009, p.86).

That had a been a huge part of my best writing times: I not only had a live audience (even if by live it was via email), and not only did we create, share, critique, and recreate, the nature of our collaborations, our relationships, was a story unto itself. Within those two circles, I not only created better work and created it more often, I ended up with deep relationships with people who inspired me. When the circle was broken, things started to decay.

I find hope in the thought that, at least for the rest of this semester, I'll have an opportunity to be a part of a new circle, that I'll be able to reignite my passion.

Lambert, J. (2009). Digital Storytelling. Digital Diner Press: Berkely.