Dear dear,
It�s been three months (almost to the day) since my last confession (diary). These are my sins:

• I was lazy. (I barely wrote shopping lists.)
• I blamed others for my lack of writing. (John Kerry, Andre Sfeir, the cast of Arrested Development)
• I coveted other people�s writing.
• I thought about cheating and recycling my old pieces as if I just wrote them. (This is not recycled.)
• I read gluttonously (and still if you ask me for something to read I will hesitate and stammer because I can�t remember much of it even though I swooned and cried and laughed at the time).

I gave myself, once again, the penance to write a page a day. Actually, Jerry B. reminded me of the page a day thing and it sounded like a good idea. That was yesterday evening, late, and I didn�t write a page. I started today.

This is not to say I will write a page every day here. I won�t put any readers out there through that. No, I�ll keep my journal. More than keep it, I�ll write in it.

A page a day. This seems like nothing, really, but I feel empty, writing-wise and before-the-fact paralyzed by fears of filling up pages, one at a time, day by day, with nothing, really. I am reflexively comparing my writing to other writing, good writing, much in the same way I compared my clothes to other people�s good clothes in junior high school. It�s just a matter of picking the RIGHT pieces and paying a LITTLE MORE, right?

Right/wrong. That axle of evil. I have an underlying right/wrong meter hard at work. It comes into focus if I squint and hold still for a minute or two, similar to my stance while in the powder room but without that sense of satisfaction of a job well done with something to show.

Whoa, what�s that all about? �Something to show for it?� That speaks volumes (no pun intended but what the hey). Clearly, I am moons away from that fresh-faced young girl who had to write because she must write. I quote Rilke here:

Go into yourself. Search for the reason that bids you write; find out whether it is spreading out its roots in the deepest places of your heart, acknowledge to yourself whether you would have to die if it were denied you to write. This above all�ask yourself in the stillest hour of your night: must I write?

The answer to that question lately, my friend, is I must go to the loo. Once again with the joke.

What is rubbing up against all of this is that I believe I have ended one of my relationships to writing. That is: grantwriter.

Here ensues a brief history of my work/academic life...

For the last year I was a grantwriter for hire. For about 11 years before that, I worked in various nonprofits writing grants, annual appeal letters, newsletters, annual reports, and all kinds of material to move people. To move them to move their cash to be more precise. I was successful, as those things go. Well, the agencies were. Awarded new grant monies, increased individual donations, the best auction ever. That�s good because I want to say and I MEAN it: they deserved it. They do good work. I believe in what they were doing. But let�s face it, I�ve been facing it, I got burnt out. Probably a long time ago. I know all the templates and jargon (most of it) and when to tug heartstrings and when not to and part of it is just plain timing. An appeal letter is like a big fat sticky-note that arrives at your door and reminds you to send $50 to that place that helps people learn to read.

I got burnt out but it was a skill I could always fall back on. Sometimes I rued the long days during which I learned to write grants. Like when I rued the days I learned to type: junior year in high school, typing class. I could type 65 words per minute in a couple of months. I got my first job in an office and made $8 an hour when all my friends made $4 or $5. Early on, I learned about office culture and company time. It was my bread and butter through my early experimental college years. My undergraduate degree was nine years in the making, with many stops and gos, and includes stints at five colleges and as many majors. I ended up with an English degree. I liked writing but didn�t want to teach.

When I first began grantwriting, for a battered women�s shelter in Albuquerque, I thought I found the way to combine my love of writing with my passion for peace. I was right. That learning there and then at the wonderful Elizabeth Stone House where pretty wonderful. It was learning, which I love.

Some weird things happened along the way, a lot of them let�s call difficult and part of the way I moved out of that was to go to graduate school. I have a Masters of Education in Creative Arts in Learning from Lesley College. It was great. I learned a lot about how I learn and how much I love learning. I taught, or something like it, with very young kids to senior citizens. There�s a lot more there but overall, I am still figuring out how to best use that learning as I go on.

For various practical reasons, I mostly kept to development/grantwriting work. This past year, as I said, I was a grantwriter for hire. I would have been a better gun for hire in some cases. While I loved the relative weightlessness of being an independent contractor, I struggled with my connection to the work. I could do a good job but it just didn�t feel as good. Ever more practical, I began looking for a full-time job. I successfully resisted getting one in development though that�s what most people wanted me for. That, and these magical fingers, that can still type up a storm.

Here ends the relatively brief history of my work/academic life.

Still, my relationship to writing: what is it? I�m continuing to contemplate this in various ways. I�m not going to go into the whole new job thing right now. I�m sure it will come up soon. My friend, Michael, a recent reader of these entries noted how I used to publish more entries. �Yes,� I said, �mostly I did that when I was working full-time jobs.� It�s true, I am a hard worker who takes breaks to write in my own diary. I am going to write a page a day, regardless, but I look forward to the old ball-and-chain routine of a full-time job that gives me the freedom to publish in my diary�. Go figure.

Must I write?

Rilke writes: Delve into yourself for a deep answer.

These are similar words to what came up when I posed the question �What is my relationship to writing?� on an online I-ching. Here, slightly reformatted was the answer:

33. Tun / Retreat

Above Ch'ien The Creative, Heaven

Below K^_en Keeping Still, Mountain

23. P'i / Standstill [Stagnation]

Above Ch'ien The Creative, Heaven

Below K'un The Receptive, Earth

Maintain a simplistic attitude while fulfilling your plan.
Do not become obligated to others below you.
Remain friendly but unattached. Success will come.

You have strayed from the path of the Dao, and are in danger
because of your weakness of character. To start again, meditate
and wait for the correct moment.

Behave in a modest and direct manner to maintain clarity of mind.
Do not be pretentious, and you will attract aid.

You are in the midst of a dangerous undertaking.
Great caution will bring success

You are in a dangerous situation that will last for some time.
Nothing can be done to remedy the situation. Wait.

Reflect upon your actions to see what you have achieved.
Examine what you have accomplished to know the future.