In what now seems like another lifetime, I might have apologized for the silence, finding fault with a punishingly busy schedule or a lengthy bout of writer’s block. Only in retrospect does the pointlessness of such apologizing – to say nothing of the excuse-mongering that accompanied it – become apparent to me.
However, possessed by the arrogance that collectively characterizes us as human beings, I tend to consider myself deeper than I might really be. It is easier for me to be convinced that I am dancing to the tune of some such subconscious agenda than to confess that my frequent post-hiatus apologies might have been born from the delusive belief that my readers have somehow been deprived or shortchanged in my absence or worse still, from an impulse without a logical or emotional foundation.
A prospect that I might entertain is that the act of apologizing must have been a convenient proxy through which I would have negotiated my disappointment over periods of my life left unrecorded. This interpretation pleases me, and for a while, it makes me feel less like the self-absorbed adolescent that I know myself to be. In this scheme of things, the act of capturing, sharing and reflecting upon the memories of my life appears to transcend the relatively selfish objective of preserving my footprint in the sands of time and becomes an imperative, a duty that I, as a writer and as a human being, have to diligently discharge. It’s a little like telling yourself that painting a self-portrait is not an exercise in narcissism but a service rendered to that yet-to-be-born grandson who is bound to be curious about what his grandfather looked like.
With due irony, I find that even this miserable excuse for an explanation is preferable to the admission that I can be incredibly superficial at times.
skip to main |
skip to sidebar
