I’m glancing at my noticeboard, at the numerous tasks I need to complete: four stories (three fiction, one personal essay) in various revision stages, three works in progress and my column. The noticeboard excludes other lesser duties: update my Tumblr blog, submit inane messages via Twitter, read my favorite blogs, read a book or two, catch up on my yearlong backlog of The New Yorker and clean up the files cluttering my iMac screen—the latter is now complete, so yay for me.

My phone and computer calendars neatly outline my weekly to-do lists; even after ten hours a day at work, I sit down and plug away, feeling submerged. Much is made by women—rightfully so—of finding time to write amid a chaotic life. I understand (to a point, I’m sure). I’m pulled toward the work, tugged by my lovely wife who’d like her husband back at some point this week. Even now, it is after 4 PM on a Saturday: we have a movie date later; I’m stressing, unnerved by the real possibility that my obsession with this writerly shit might result in a missed date, a rescheduled date, a date with the cold side of the bed.

I deal with extremes: when I don’t write, I can experience a dry spell for months (a year being the longest); on the other hand, when I get going, when I feel I’ve struck a groove, nothing can pull me away. I get angry and hoard my time, in part because I think I’ve wasted enough of it for so long, in part because there’s a hint of inferiority involved.  I blame The New Yorker. 20 Under 40 or whatever the fuck they titled it. Seven months until I’m thirty. I push. I deny myself sleep. I hurl myself into poor health, poor eating habits, chain smoking and depressive episodes: the opposite of this madness is a half-me, a cleaved personality closed off to the world. No one diagnosed me as bipolar, but my love for writing approaches the maniacal. Thank God we don’t have kids—just a whiny black Labrador.

I marvel at writers who fawn over the process, those individuals who carve koans out of craft, who imbue the work with the splendor of a nature hike. They’re aliens to me. Sometimes I call shenanigans on the love fest, because no one can possibly enjoy writing. Sure, they might enjoy writing about writing—Lord knows I do—and they get a rise from blogs and articles on procrastination, on query letters and searches for agents, of e-books and Amazon, of character sketches and Moleskines.

A culture of fellow writers romping through fields of daisies, traipsing along with commentary regarding the writing life, as if it’s a way of life as opposed to plain drudgery. I want to call them on their bullshit because the world offers more useful, more enjoyable activities: smoking weed, scouring Youtube for Sailor Moon clips, oral sex, bowling, shooting skeet (skeetskeetskeet). Perhaps I’m projecting my malady onto others; maybe writing is actually—you know—fun. Admittedly, it used to be fun when I wasn’t obsessed with control, with being deliberate in what (and how) I write, with authenticity, with the archeology that guarantees more visits to my psychotherapist. That’s not to say these happy writers, these pod people, aren’t trying hard enough. Maybe they’re well adjusted; if so, God bless them.

Or maybe they’re better at compartmentalization. Art seeps into all aspects of my life—just ask my wife behind me, impatiently waiting to start our date. There’s no right or wrong way to go about the work; there’s no such thing as “the writing life.” I can be accused of subscribing to the myth in the past, and I apologize for perpetuating it, but what the how-to guides and the Internet calls “the writing life” is a caricature of reality. It’s so simple: you can spend your entire life, and income, wanting to be a writer without scribbling a word. Even more insane is the notion of “wanting” to be a writer.

I mean, I am a writer—I want to be better, so I can be read—but why would anyone sit on the couch and think to themselves, “Of all the things to be; I shall be a writer.” I guess, on its face, creative writing appears easy. Shit, you go to the movies: anyone can write something better than the Big Mama’s House series. Perhaps that point is the tieback to those hippy, happy-go-lucky writers smiling toothy grins, turning the work into a faith-based initiative, a Zen-like experience, an otherworldly adventure. I’m more apt to believe writer-bloggers posting hopeless, tearful tomes about their disintegrating novels. I can understand the pain; that shit’s real. And when they fix the novel, when they’re back on track, they go silent—dead air—until reemerging with the details.

So fuck it. Some so-called writers are fraudulent and it pisses me off—clearly. I’m berating myself, racing against the clock, because the sun is gone and I’ve spent five hours writing five essays for this column so I can get back to a thirteen-page short story begging for a hatchet. And even if I succeed, I still got seven more pieces on my noticeboard, laughing at me with the husky chortle of Muttley, and in the face of all of this work, somewhere in my bitter heart, I’m happy. A small twinkle, a blip against the night; I’m still surrounded by maniacal mana and sometimes, I search the Internet (first mistake) for help on how to deal. Take a break, stretch your legs, treat yourself when you accomplish a goal: whatever, man—tell me to think positive thoughts, while you’re at it.

@thomasdemary. [at]thomasdemary.