I'm going to call it writer's syndrome, though there may be a real name for it, I expect it's fairly common. I've had this kind of eenui for as long as I can remember—it's not terrible, just...there. The gist of the feeling is this: no matter how good life gets (and life is pretty awesome; I love life), I can imagine better. So far, I don't sound too special, I know. Everyone has those moments, whether they're ambitions, imaginings, dreams. But being a writer, specifically a writer of fiction, more specifically a writer of fantasy, I am always dreaming, and my dreams are always impossible. And since I write, I have to imagine the impossible thoroughly as if it were everyday life. While I'm writing, I'm living the impossible, and it's difficult to pull myself out at the end. They say that what is even worse than knowing something is impossible, is having even the slightest hope that it isn't. Now I'm not not a head case; I don't believe in fairies, etc. But I do believe that in order to write about something convincingly, a writer has to find something very close to belief in the moment that she is tying words together from pure inspiration and putting them down on screen or paper. The result is a sort of warring Yin and Yang (yes, I realize that's contradictory) of hope and belief in one's own stories, and the knowledge that none of it can ever exist.
...Is there such a thing as a fashionable straightjacket?
...Is there such a thing as a fashionable straightjacket?