jem on jém

[ENTRY-004]

terminal\user\jem\journal

Typically an entry takes me anywhere from two to three hours to write, sometimes even more. Today I want to try with just two.

Usually I accrue enough thoughts throughout the week to fill an entry with what I consider a reasonable amount of words. Passing observations, ideas for topics, quotes I’ve recognised as vocal stims or just little jests are added to a pile and in the moment I deem them possibly interesting enough to talk about in the future. The moment has come and now I feel better off leaving them on the ground for later.

My brain routinely demands high-quality words and focus-group-tested paragraphs as if my mind is being run by a committee. To the highest standard I can fathom every thought must be well-optimised and read as interesting at an exceedingly high average compared to everything I’ve ever written in my life. But it would all be too cold and calculated and sterile were it not for the good dose of humanity and introspection I shoot up into my veins before falling back into my seat. I am exhausted and elated to know I’ve lampshaded my struggles in written word and it renders my form impenetrable to any criticism or second thought. It doesn’t.

There exists no combination of letters I can use to acutely describe the egregious howl I could cry from performing this dance over and over again (slight hyperbole). I am the only person that writes the way I do, and more often than not I don’t take that as a positive. I think it’s reflective of the way I tend to handle most situations in life, particularly my creative endeavours. I love to ruminate and think about things far more than actually doing them because it requires no discipline on my end to daydream.

When I write I feel at home inside an ancient temple. I’ve explored it countless times but I keep forgetting where most of the weighted pressure plates and trapdoors and false walls are located. I don’t bother to search for clues to open the big skull door because it’s easier to take a sledgehammer to it. I’ve already proven myself so why go through it all again? Why should I make careful step after step through the hall that shoots arrows at me when sprinting and ducking through them works almost just as fine? I’m starting to not like the analogy now as much as I did three minutes ago but the bottom line is I liken the experience of writing and getting all my words out to just barely making it out alive. Exhausted and (mentally) bruised but breathing nonetheless.

I’ve grown to love spamming my deep self-awareness into my writing so much that it feels like an exploit, like I’m animation-cancelling real thoughts. Occasionally I love pulling random bullshit from a bag and throwing it at the wall, crossing my fingers that something will stick.

Deep down I harbour a jealousy (mocapped by Andy Serkis) for people and artists that I perceive to have a more expressive or unique writing style than my own. But even further down I want to deliver my thoughts in a manner that feels truly representative of my entire identity. I hope that one day I can point a stranger or new friend to these entries to help them better gauge their perception of my character. Those detailed blocks of how I think and feel can do a better job free from lulls in a conversation or the tripping over of my own words. In no way would I want to replace all physical, interpersonal interactions with written ones. But wouldn’t it be nice to have a populated depository or personal Wikipedia for someone to make a face-value judgement, as opposed to a few empty warehouses of inactive socials?

It’s been five hours of on-and-off writing now. I have reached a natural conclusion, to me at least. I feel good about my next entry.

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