It’s been a bit. I’d like to say that this hiatus was in service of something noble, or even that I’ve continued to generate content. Unfortunately, I cannot. My ready excuse is life stuff. A busted hot water pipe followed by weeks of restoration. New interior paint in half my home. A sick spouse followed by an injured pet. I want to blame the numerous vagaries of day to day life that make it easy to put off calling up the blank white page. But these are just excuses.
The truth is, I’ve been doing more thinking than writing lately because it’s easier and safer to let things remain akin to what I recently discovered described as “maladaptive daydreaming.” This is a form of psychosis where the happy individual has difficulty completing common tasks because of an overwhelming desire to remain engaged in vivid daydreams that are complex, based off events in their life, and detailed in both plot and character. I think this condition deserves a less clinical title. It should be called the “Mitty Avoidance Complex” (a nod to James Thurber’s eponymously named short story character) or perhaps just Mitty Complex.
I’m not a full blown victim of maladaptive daydreaming. In fact, you could say I merely have an itty bitty Mitty Complex. I’m capable of other forms of escape. Sometimes I just cue up Sophie’s Choice, Silkwood, The Bridges of Madison County, as well as The Iron Lady and submerge myself in a nice hot deep Streep steep. Yes, I binge watch some guilty pleasures on Netflix. The less said of that the better. I’m looking at you Drew Barrymore and Timothy Olyphant.
I have been working on a short story, although it’s been percolating on the back shelf for too long. I’ve also got the rudiments of another poem or two rattling around. All of which means zero if I write none of it down. There is nothing sadder than a writer who will not or cannot stay committed. This is my personal Sisyphean ball that never fails to roll backwards onto me, leaving me stuck to the outside as it rolls inexorably to the bottom of a canyon worthy of a Wily E. Coyote cartoon.
Not writing shares a lot in common with not exercising. Both are necessary, make me feel better after having done it, and hopefully make me slightly more attractive to the opposite sex. I approach the prospect of both like the recalcitrant mule of yore. Lots of baying, stamping of feet, biting of bits, and overall grumpiness. And also like the mule, I forget about what I was so against once I actually start doing it.
What is it that I’ve been daydreaming about these last few months? Let’s just say it involves a cast of characters so vile, so low, so unredeemable that almost no fate is too severe. There is a direct relationship to the quality of a story and the quality of the antagonist. My favorite villians are urbane, polite, complex, utterly vicious in the pursuit of their goal, and so vastly flawed that while I may share some sympathy, I applaud their eventual fate. I can also find satisfaction in antagonists that are not human. The grind of history. Nature’s cold impartiality. The unintended consequences of seemingly sound reason. Not all evil is human evil. Although to be fair, it does claim the lion share.
If you recall, those who suffer from a Mitty Complex, either of the itty bitty or Walter whale size, base their fantasies off of real life events. Have you been paying attention to real life events lately? If so, I suspect I’m not the only one engaging in acrobatic flights of fancy.
I just hope the orange jumpsuit matches his complexion in the same hue I see it in one of my favorite inner movies.