Life is Change, Changing
I had lunch with a friend last week. A senior human resources professional and an ethnographer, she is a woman whose formidable intelligence leaves me breathless…and slightly anxious. She asked me how I would finish the sentence “Life is…” I said “Life is not for the faint of heart.” Now that I have had a chance to think about it I would change what I said to: “Life is change.” All things change. All things flow. What we are today we will not be tomorrow. Life is change. I am change.
Like a lot of people, I have been many things: secretary, copy clerk, retail store manager, strategic communications professional. Each job, each job title adding a piece to the puzzle forming the terrifying, unexpected whole of me—the whole itself a motley, unreasonable compilation of my parents, my experiences, people I’ve known, or read of, and admired, characters from F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novels. As I approach publication of my first book, What Binds Us, on March 19, I can add another piece to the puzzle of me: author.
I am an author, a writer, a wordsmith. I am a man. I am black. I am gay. I am a gay, black man. I am a writer. Though, that is not all that I am, it certainly informs who I am just as every other facet of me informs, enriches each of the others.
I am a writer. I see the world not in colors or shapes but in words. If you see me staring at you on the street, don’t be offended for I don’t mean to be rude. I am merely trying to see you, trying to see into you, to capture and describe your particular youness, trying to describe the essence of you. Perhaps you will become a character in that other world inside my head, that other world that will eventually make its slow way onto paper.
No matter what I do next―even if I never publish another word―I will always be a writer. I. Am. A. Writer. That I am, at my core, a writer is as immutable, as constant a fact as my race, my orientation.
I am a writer…I scratch on the wall of my prison, daily, nightly, for I am a writer. These scratchings, they tell a story, if only you will listen, and like all prisoners, words set me, set us, free.
Like a lot of people, I have been many things: secretary, copy clerk, retail store manager, strategic communications professional. Each job, each job title adding a piece to the puzzle forming the terrifying, unexpected whole of me—the whole itself a motley, unreasonable compilation of my parents, my experiences, people I’ve known, or read of, and admired, characters from F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novels. As I approach publication of my first book, What Binds Us, on March 19, I can add another piece to the puzzle of me: author.
I am an author, a writer, a wordsmith. I am a man. I am black. I am gay. I am a gay, black man. I am a writer. Though, that is not all that I am, it certainly informs who I am just as every other facet of me informs, enriches each of the others.
I am a writer. I see the world not in colors or shapes but in words. If you see me staring at you on the street, don’t be offended for I don’t mean to be rude. I am merely trying to see you, trying to see into you, to capture and describe your particular youness, trying to describe the essence of you. Perhaps you will become a character in that other world inside my head, that other world that will eventually make its slow way onto paper.
No matter what I do next―even if I never publish another word―I will always be a writer. I. Am. A. Writer. That I am, at my core, a writer is as immutable, as constant a fact as my race, my orientation.
I am a writer…I scratch on the wall of my prison, daily, nightly, for I am a writer. These scratchings, they tell a story, if only you will listen, and like all prisoners, words set me, set us, free.
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Brenda
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Mar 07, 2012 06:09AM
as I said....I am so proud of you Larry. For as long as I've known you, you have wanted to be a published author. You have always had the soul of a writer. You dont need some publisher to tell you. That is something I struggle with.....I need to believe in myself before someone else can (sounds corny but true)
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Thanks Brenda. Your words mean a lot (still waiting to hear my mother say she's proud of me but that's probably another blog post. LOL)Not corny, true. My advice when other writers waiting to be published ask, is don't stop believing in yourself, tell your stories, write (draw or paint or sing) what you feel you need to.
You just helped me think through my blog for next Tuesday so look for it. Thanks again
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