I've recently been re-reading 'Moab is my Washpot', the first installment of the autobiography of Mr. Steven Fry (whom I greatly admire!), because it is a good read, and an amazing autobiography (having only read a handful of autobiographies ('Never have your dog stuffed' Alan Alda; 'And it's Goodnight from Him' The Two Ronnies; 'Dear Fatty' Dawn French; 'Look Back in Hunger' Jo Brand; and obviously 'Moab is my Washpot' Stephen Fry)) will happily place it at the top of the list.
But an analysis of the book itself can wait, what I wish to ramble about is that it's got me thinking, predominantly of two separate themes. Firstly: writing; Secondly: Riding for a fall.
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1)
I hate it, genuinely hate it, cringe, pull funny faces, joke about the topic, want to die hate it, when people ask me what I want to do as a career. Partially because most of the jobs within the theatre/performing arts industry sound ridiculously pretentious. "Oh, I wish to be an actor/director/blah blah self-sanctifying blah"; and partially because I never really know. I have a great passion for Shakespeare (and quite a lot of Elizabethan/Jacobean literature). I thoroughly enjoy directing plays, I also thoroughly enjoy acting (though I am well aware of my lack of talent). I had a brief period of considering a comedy career but, apparently, in order to be a comic one must be funny. Not likely then.
But the one thing, the one horrible, pretentious thing that has always been there in my life. The one thing that, had I the balls I would openly admit I wanted to do 'when I grow up', is write.
I want to be a writer.
Even typing it fills me with dread. I'm not sure that sentence will actually make the final post.
I want to write 'Doctor Who', I want to write plays, and poetry (don't judge me). I do, in a nobody-will-ever-ever-read-this way. My vague comedy dreams circulated around me writing sketches. I have all these stories and ideas zooming around my mind that I really want to write and have people see them, read them, experience them. I don't want it to be a secret, I want to be good enough that I needn't fear it. That I won't think up a damn good line and then think "What a pity nobody will ever see it".
But.... I'm not that good. I'm not a master of the English language. I can barely manage the complexities of a normal conversation with a cabbie, let alone scribe lines that could pass the scrutiny of a publisher/producer/director/(God forbid)audience.
"You'll never know unless you try!"
I don't want to try. I don't want to try because I don't want to fail. This is something that I love and by keeping it purely to myself my delusions of grandeur shall never be shattered by somebody saying "Well... that's shit."
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2)
That was merely the first train of thought Mr. Fry set about my mind. The second becomes even more narcissistic in nature. This is the one thing that I have been told by every teacher I have encountered that knew my name. This is something I have been told by family and friends alike. For as long as mankind has been a master of the disapproving look I have been looked at disapprovingly whilst informed of the following.
I am riding for a fall.
A few simple facts:
-I have never revised for an exam. I am yet to fail an A-Level/GCSE/whatever (though I have intentionally sabotaged a couple of papers because of boredom).
-I have never written an essay/started an assignment more than a day ahead of time. Again, am yet to fail one.
-I have never sat down and actively learnt lines. I have never dried onstage.
-I have often left scenes undirected until the last minute waiting for inspiration to strike. (Rather unfairly meaning that anybody working with me needs to be damn on the ball and able to work well and work quick.)
-I have gone to run workshops with nothing prepared and just improvised.
-I leave most of my life until the last possible minute and somehow seem to get away with it. It rarely crosses my mind that it wouldn't get done. Starting my A-Level English Language coursework at 02:00am on the day it was due it never crossed my mind that it wouldn't happen, because it does. It always does.
This isn't arrogance. I never really flaunt these facts and this attitude, it isn't very becoming. This really, honestly, sincerely isn't me saying 'Look how clever I am' because I'm really not. I often fear my IQ dips below double digits, so grand is my incompetence at life. Just the everyday aspects of life like conversation, being normal, paying attention, maintaining the social norms etc. These are just the facts. These are the reasons why I have been told, for as long as I can remember, that I am going to fail one day and that I shall deserve it.
One day I shall get a shock when I am fail at something for which I have not tried. (I would also like to impress upon you that I do try at things. I have occasionally been known to work very hard, for all the good it's done.)
What I have been riding on throughout my educational career thus far is not intelligence (L, O, and L), as opposed to luck. I rather imagine, taking the example of my English coursework, that I only did rather well because my teacher had never seen an episode of 'Doctor Who' in his life, not because of my skillful linguistic analysis. I like the imagine the staffroom conversation was something like:
"A: What's a Rutan?
B: I dunno, but they're at war with the Sontarans.
A: The what?
B: *shrugs shoulders* Apparently they were invented by Robert Holmes.
A: Is he an alien?
B: He's the writer!
A: *Confused face* Sod it, we'll give her an A"
But, rarely does effort (in my education) pay off. Looking now at the first term of my time at university. The things in which I did well were those for which I could have hardly put in less effort. In some cases the
only way that I could have put less effort in would have been not to write the damn things. However, the module in which I put in the effort, I remained conscious and actually paid attention, took stuff in and did the reading; at that I failed miserably. I showed exactly zero improvement throughout the course of the term.
This is only the most recent of a lifetime of examples. If I try at something, rather if I have to try at something, I'm shit at it. And I'm rather fed up at being shit at the stuff that I like as opposed to the stuff I couldn't give a damn about.
This also appears to have gone off on something of a tangent. And has no real conclusion. One day I will crash and burn, the people in my life have happily and continually informed me of this. Statistics inform me of this, my luck has to run out. I can't live a life on chance.
There appears to be, somewhere within me, lord knows how it got there but it is deeply embedded, a sort of blasé faire mentality that I cannot seem to shake. It's probably immaturity, a sort of 'Fuck you!' way of seeing the world. You insult me, you fail me, I shall just become more introvert, less co-operative, less organised. If you must keep telling me that I am 'riding for a fall' then the childish part of my brain shall merely climb onto my metaphorical horse, place a blindfold over my eyes and thunder onward; because I can. It is yet to let me down.
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So, there you go. Those are two pools of thought taking up precious brain space that I thought I would share with... well, nobody.
There's an odd safety in posting all this here, because I know nobody reads it. Nobody gives a shit. It's rather liberating.
