Karl Norman

I knew that I would inevitably leave long gaps between writing here, but somehow I didn't think it would only take me two posts to exhaust my immediate supply of handy anecdotes. Considering that I don't have a job and that I am on University holidays at the moment, it's really almost bizarre how easily my day becomes occupied.

Last year, in the same situation, I resolved to write a movie script based on an idea that I was throwing around with Ray towards the end of the semester. The plan was that I would write it, and then when it was done, we would film it (badly) using camcorders. Except, as normally happens with my projects (novels #1-4, screenplays #1-3) I began the work, and fleshed out roughly the structure of it, and then abruptly lost drive. In this case it was mostly because I was unsure of who would play the main characters, and I didn't feel as though I would have enough friends involved to fill the roles. So I lost a reason to work on it constantly, since it probably wouldn't be filmed even if I did finish it, and without a good reason to work on it, it quickly started to gather dust. The problem is that while I love the creative process, I usually get completely frozen trying to work my way through what I see as irreconcilable flaws in how it is unfolding. I'm very aware that I should just get it written and then agonise over the editing later on, but it doesnt make it any easier to move onto a new section when I feel as though what I've already written is awful. More to the point I feel like what I wrote hasn't really done the idea itself justice. I am fond of some of the dialogue, though. I'm trying to continue it, I wrote a new scene a few days ago that I quite like. Here is part of it.

JEREMY (V.O.)
(as he writes)
Dear diary. Today, I decided that I would start a diary.

Jeremy scowls at what he’s written so far. He waits a little. He tears out the first page and screws it up.

JEREMY (V.O., cont.)
Today, at work, I-

JEREMY
NYAARGH!!

FEMALE VOICE
You actually wrote “Nyaargh”?

Jeremy looks around and finds Herpsma looking over his shoulder.

HERPSMA
Yes! Me!

JEREMY
Uh… what?

HERPSMA
Oh.

JEREMY
Oh?

HERPSMA
Hmm!

JEREMY
What?

HERPSMA
I thought you were going to say “YOU?!”

It's a silly sort of movie, mostly about taking things lightly and making life decisions that are relevant to yourself, not ones that are based on other people's concepts. It's also just a fun sort of thing with (hopefully) lovely characters who are fun. I want to blend a profound sort of love of the life experience with a recognition of the complete absurdity of it all. If you've seen Garden State, Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind, and Amelie, you have some idea of where it's aimed. Not that I am putting this on the same level as those, just that I think I'm dealing with similar themes.

Incidentally, if anything resembling the script excerpt I quoted shows up anywhere else, there will be hunting, this hunting will involve blood, and that blood will be yours, dear anonymous reader. I am extremely possessive of my writing. Just so you know.

Hmm, it is Christmas. Paganism meets commercialism and they have a party together. Not that I have anything against paganism, mind you. I don't know - despite my cynicism about the ceremonial sort of side of it and the crass consumer ethic which gets rubbed in everyone's faces in the days beforehand, I do still like it. Anything which has people being decent to eachother can't be all bad and it is good to have things in the world that keep it beautiful. The thing I like about Christmas is the together-ness, the feeling of community or of unity. I just wish that it didn't take a yearly holiday to bring out that side of us. Share the love all the time, not just when it is deemed culturally significant!

Anyway that will be all for now. I shall try to write more often because I do enjoy it.



 

The Silence Of Noise

Talking to someone, and they leave, perhaps fetching a drink or joining another conversation. For a moment my thoughts are still on the conversation, and then the background noise saturates me. All the other conversations in the room are crawling over me. My conciousness could flick to this one, or that one, and select just those voices, and hear just these words, but for now it stays drifting. So there's no comprehension of any of it. Odd phrases, fragments come and go, like ripples across the surface of a pool. I let go of that, and I have just a wave of sound. In this raw mass of conversations overlapping, without any meanings to latch onto, it is suddenly as though I am alone in silence.

It was a nice party, I imagine. Putting aside the introspective detachment that seems to sometimes dog my steps like, well, a dog, I had a generally pleasant time. It is always lovely to see long-time friends, and all together, in pleasant moods. The loud, rather awful kareoke singing was fun. I was tempted to have a turn myself, but this feeling was beaten out of me by the repetition of awful pop music. A pleasant time for a diversionary phonecall.

Later, some of us took a walk through the dark streets. It was a lovely night, nary a cloud and nary a breeze, though rather cold. For a second time, I found myself between (or betwixt, if you prefer it that way) two groups. It was less alienating the second time. I am fond of the night. There is a quietness to it, and an intimacy to it, that daytime lacks. Daylight has distinctiveness too of course, it is more lively and unashamedly happy, but I am fond of the dark smile and the quiet moments.

Also, my sleep patterns are somewhat asynchronous, so I tend to see the night just as much as the day, anyway.

If my previous entry was a soliloquay on what I love about the morning, then equally this is what I love about the night. Sometimes it is difficult to know what times I would really like to be awake, because they all have impressions, and memories.

If anything, the big memory that tonight's walk triggered for me was a cumulative one, of the various night walks on the various camps through school. What I loved wasn't the destination, but the walking. Night in a quiet place, or night in the wilderness, is one of the few things in the world that still has a quasi-mystical, otherworldy or spiritual essence at its core (two others that I can think of are sex and music, though I am sure there are more). During the day everything is reducible to elements and things are simply what they are, but at night sounds are sharper, vision is deceptive and there is an elusiveness to the world. It is something to enjoy, I think. Except when the imagination makes sounds into monsters.


Peace. 

Hello, Sun

If there is one thing to be said for irregular sleep patterns, it's that it completely changes the way you experience times of day. It has been a long time since I have been awake at this time of day; recently my sleeping pattern has been something along the lines of six in the morning until three in the afternoon, and I had completely forgotten what mornings look like, beyond the cold hint of sunrise that tells you that you should be in bed at six. So here I am, writing a sociology assignment, and it's only now that I realise that I had forgotten what the mid-morning looked like.

Do I expect that to be some sort of profound insight?

Well, I suppose not. Consider, though, that someone who wears glasses is just a tiny bit more amazed by sight than someone who has always had perfect eyes. If you follow me on that, you can understand what I feel, because seeing the light outside at midmorning, like a warm blanket and a soft embrace, is something that I am appreciating right now, in its immediacy, much more than I ever did when I got up to go to school every day and looked out the car window without ever quite noticing it.

So though it does sound a little odd, I am experiencing morning in a way that is new for me. I am going to regret it later, when I will be reminded more strongly that I didn't sleep, but for now I would rather just enjoy the sensation.

I suppose that is a reasonable way to start a blog.



Peace.