When I was very young, I realized two very important things. The first was that no matter what I might believe, I wasn’t special. In fact, it might even be suggested that the mere fact that I wasn’t special in the least, thereby made me special. But, by and large, I’m not any more or less special than the next guy. That was a lesson that made me want to act out. Eventually, acting outgrew tedious, not to mention dangerous.
The second epiphany was much less philosophical in nature. I like writing. Whether it is lists, reviews, thoughts, and for lack of anything better to do, stories that have no import or basis, in reality, I like to write.
Anyone who does anything they love and gets paid to do it eventually develops a love/hate relationship with it. I know. Somewhere along the line, I forgot how happy writing made me feel. After I graduated from college and after the luster had faded from my first real gig writing for someone else, I stopped writing for passion’s sake and started writing for paycheck’s sake. Fortunately, through misfortune or fortune (depending on which side of the paycheck you’re sitting on), I am discovering once again what it is like to write for passion’s sake. While I’d like to take the credit for this rediscovered love affair with the written word, in all honesty, I can’t.
Recently, a friend of mine decided that he wanted to become a writer. Just like that. He writes with the same enthusiasm I had back in the day. While I’ve kept an online journal or blog since 2001 (More Inhuman Than Human), it took a graphic designer turned travel writer to remind me what it is about putting pen to paper (or as in this case, pixel to processor).
That said, the Monkey Diaries are all the random thoughts and stories that I come across from day-to-day. It’s where I put it all down so it doesn’t interfere with what I’m doing outside of this blog which is writing a screenplay that will hopefully get purchased by some Hollywood mogul hellbent on winning an oscar. For my part, I just want the voices in my head, the characters that swim in my blood, and the visions that dance nightly in my dreams to stop.