I am working on a story that requires me to draw on some old memories. Thus, I have been looking back over notes and poems that I wrote when I was much younger; near the beginning of my writing endeavours. Some people find their early work cringe-inducing; and I admit that there are rare moments when I am almost shocked, unpleasantly, by the naïvety of much of my earliest work.
But then I remember that we all begin incompetent. No one starts as a master of their art. And I note that the substance, the meaning or idea of the work, is solid and real and worthy: it is the execution that is naïve. The turn of phrase, the use of vocabulary, the structure — these may be clumsy, in the same way that a puppy's first attempts at running and jumping and generally being athletic are unwittingly clumsy and bumbling and often hilariously inept.
We don't expect puppies to be good at anything. We don't ask a sapling why it is not a tree. Likewise, let us not criticise our early efforts, but look upon them with kindness; and note that it is not our content nor our intent that is flawed: merely our execution. We are unpractised: that is all.
It brings me a sense of sadness and grief to read some of these early poems. I am drawing upon them for my fictional story, but they are already a part of my life's story. I read my recounting of, and commentary upon, some early parts of my life and I am struck by both the unwitting cruelty of the people around me and how sad I was. A poor sad child, having to deal with idiocy and misunderstanding from adults and children alike, be they relatives, acquaintances, or strangers.
There is a reason why so many of my characters are freaks or outcasts of one sort or another.
Trauma and pain are often senseless. I will not say that everything happens for a reason; I am not convinced that is does, unless the reason be that the world is a horrible, wicked, unjust place full of cruel, selfish people. Sometimes the "reason" in "everything happens for a reason" is that the world is a sick and rotten place. But I will say that trauma and pain can teach us useful things; and I will say that if nothing else, we may be able to get a story out of it; a story that may ease the pain of someone else, if only for a moment.
And maybe the story will help its creator to heal, if only a little.
I like the mental image of taking the pain that was inflicted upon you and using it to fuel your own fire, rather than turning it upon anyone else or using it to punish yourself. Pain and trauma are like arrows shot into you. You can push them deeper into yourself. You can yank them out and shoot them back at your attacker. You can yank them out and shoot them at a third party. You can yank them out and leave them, bloodied, in a pile on the ground. You can throw them on a fire to warm yourself. You can use the arrowheads to scratch a message into a wall. You can strip the iron heads off, burn the shafts, and use the heat of the fire to forge the arrowheads into a work of art, or into a weapon.
Either way, you are bleeding and wounded and in pain. But now you have arrows, too. You never asked for them; you never wanted them; that they were shot at you is not your fault; and how well armoured you were, and the quality of the healing you may or may not receive, are separate questions.
You can do anything, or nothing, with those arrows. But they are yours now. And maybe they cost you too much for you to do nothing with them.
