After having gone through some essays of famous writers about why they write, I would like to say that it is my passion to write. I would like to say that writing is in the very core of who or what I am, animating my body and that writing is as much a necessity in my life as the food in my stomach or the roof over my head. I would like to say that I cannot stand not to write or that my writing serves some abstract higher purpose, far beyond the gratification of my own ego; that I’m on some kind of quest into the frontlines of the human mystery. I would like to. But as they say, I would like to but I cannot.
I can say that I have a strong affinity to writing but I also hate writing every now and then. I think all writers do sometimes. We write to our master pieces in the security of our bedrooms under the disguise of “just a little something I’m working on” and we pour ourselves into them until they begin to reject us and they we hand them over to our friends to critic and we say about our master piece “Please read, it’s nothing much.”
I can say that every time I spot a new irony or discover an idiosyncrasy or even when I realize see something infinitely familiar in a completely different light, my first instinct is to mull over it in written words. But even these words sometimes have a tendency to mutate for the worse when the prospect comes along of having an audience. For some reason, the snot from my nose becomes the perfect color of avocado or the gum under my desk at school is fondled by a virgin lover.
I can say try to be profound and say that why I write is exactly to discover why I write. And then I can turn around and write a piece of short fiction with no other compulsion than that which comes from requirement as an assignment in FA 111.4 Writing Workshop 4: Fiction under the Fine Arts Department in the Ateneo de Manila University.
I can say that stuff, I can probably think of more stuff to say or I can just write!
