Reflections

A. Looking Glass House

1. "Reflections" – Although we are just into the year 2020, reflect on all that’s transpired so far. How is your year going? In the right or wrong direction? Create a blog entry (or static item) for this. (<1000 words)

Reflections

A week into Wonderland and you ask me what happened in the previous two months? I know things must have happened but no way can I remember them. Probably I wrote a few poems and short stories (hang on a mo, I remember that I also wrote an essay about cells) but, without looking, I couldn’t tell you what they were.

Until Wonderland is done, I cannot think of anything else. I’m like this, you see. If I get involved in something, it consumes me and all my energies are devoted to it until either it is completed or I give up. Don’t tell me I’m taking it too seriously; it’s the way I am and nothing will change that.

Of course I know that I’m tilting at windmills. I’ll bet Don Quixote knew what he was doing too. But, if I’m to write like Mr Dodgson, I’ll try to be better than him too. Yeah, he’s an enormous windmill, but he lived over a hundred years ago and the literary world has moved on since then. We’re all a lot more sophisticated now and have the advantages of the computer as well. We can beat him while also paying homage by trying to reproduce the wonderful spirit of his writing.

I once asked my wife (because she asked) to write a poem in the style of Robert Frost. About two hours later she showed me a poem that could have been written by him. Except that it was better. So I thought I’d make it hard for her. “Write me a poem in the style of Dylan Thomas,” I said. A couple of hours later, there it was, a dead ringer for Thomas’ work.

To this day I have no idea how she does that. I’ve tried to write like my favourite poets but it always ends up sounding like me. But a little while ago I realised that I can do it in prose. Last year I wrote a short story that was supposed to be in homage to A.A. Milne. It sounded just like him. And now I find that I can do Lewis Carroll too. Yes, I know that it also sounds like me but the echoes are there, the feel is reproduced somehow.

Of course I can’t think of anything but Wonderland at the moment. I am immersed in it and anything else is just a distraction. It wakes me up at three in the morning with ideas for the next assignment and then the thinking won’t let go until I get up and write it all down at the keyboard.

Is this the right or wrong direction? I can’t stop it, so is that a meaningful question? I know that I’ll end up with a few pieces that I’ll be proud of and hang up in my portfolio to gather dust, at least. But right and wrong means nothing to someone on a speeding train that they can’t stop. It’s a direction, that’s all.

I also know that I’ll be enormously indebted to those who had the idea for the challenge/project and made it happen. There may have been times when I’ve wriggled and grumbled about some task not to my liking, but it’s all part of the mad career towards the finish. Thank you, thank you to those who planned and presented this wild ride to me. It is absolutely fantastic (in the real meaning of the word).

To sum up, I guess you could say that yes, it’s been a good year so far.


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