Shrouded or Shuttered. Fluctuations and Obligations. No Assurances. And the Shape of the Heart.

Am fluctuating between Coldplay and Chopin this morning, watching the spring snow fall while I sit at my desk -  that privilege.  Wandering through poems by Neruda, the Dhammapada, and Woolf's diaries.  Underlined this by Woolf:  "I feel I can use up everything I've ever thought."  This is from her entry of Monday, October 15th.  She also records that she wrote her 100th page of Mrs. Dalloway the same day.  That she is maybe writing 50 words a morning. 

I love details like these, coming across them.  As for me, I wrote my 6oth page this morning, and I'm proceeding at a similar pace.  Very happy if I can write 50 words, 4 or 5 mornings a week.  I also have notebooks full of plot outlines - mostly abandoned.  Also, possible endings, scenes, quotations, words.  This quotation from Woolf's diaries, Saturday, November 1st entry:  "If one could be friendly with women, what a pleasure - the relationship so secret and private compared with relations with men.  Why not write about it?  Truthfully?"  This, I find, is what I'm most interested in attempting to do. 

I have been thinking about love, friendship, about how it's possible to fall in love with your own fictional characters, and maybe this is why I have lately become obsessed with the shape of hearts.  Finding them everywhere.  Looking.  Thinking about Neruda's 'shrouded heart.'  (in other translations I notice it's a 'shuttered heart').  About obligations.  To the self, to the soul.  Half of the week I'm the one cooped up, the other half, I seem to be the one 'listening to the sea', 'drawn on by my destiny.' I tell you, it's quite confusing. 

The thing is, I'm feeling like I can use up everything I've ever thought in this new obscure novel of mine.  It's glorious and terrifying.  And I'm likely quite deluded.  From White Ink by H. Cixous:  "To allow oneself to write is a monstrosity."  and "It's, for example, to think oneself born to write or capable of writing...no-one in the world, unless you make yourself a god, can assure you of your capacity."  I find this is somehow reassuring - the fact of no assurances.