Untitled engraving of Sea Monsters Attacking a Sailing Vessel, 1684. Johann Christian Wagner, Photo Credit: Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
The other day I had the opportunity to see one of my favorite authors, Neil Gaiman, in person, celebrating the life and work of another of my favorite authors, Ray Bradbury. Neil Gaiman’s Coraline and The Graveyard Book pleasantly haunted my childhood imagination; in my teens Ray Bradbury’s prolific exuberance provided me with ample fodder for a tear through one, then another, of his short story anthologies. Both authors were instrumental in convincing me that to be a writer, the first thing one must do is write – and write consistently, even every day, as Bradbury did from the age of twelve on. Discipline, they insisted, far from being detrimental to zest and gusto and inspiration, fanned the flames of those things, channeled them, purified them.(And I, taking up my pen in youthful imitation and aiming to write every day, believed them).
So it was a pleasant surprise to receive an email informing me that Columbia Residential Life, earlier this month, was providing free tickets to see Neil Gaiman live, hosting a “Selected Shorts” podcast in commemoration of Ray Bradbury. Gaiman himself, as well as several stage and screen actors, would read selected pieces from Bradbury’s oeuvre. I was excited. I was also anxious, seeing that the tickets would be distributed by raffle in the Schapiro main lobby to all those in attendance. I pictured hordes of people clamoring for the sight of Gaiman, the sound of Bradbury – certainly not the total of eleven people who showed up to claim the thirteen tickets available. But that was how it turned out, and so happily I got to go.
And it was worth it. It was worth it less because of the signed books for sale, less because of the particular stories that were read – I was familiar with all of them – as because of the motivation it provided. Hearing Bradbury’s stories read aloud reminded me of the sheer exuberant poetry of his prose that so inspired me when I was younger, the unabashed and wistful passion that shone out when the great beast rose from the sea in “The Fog Horn,” or the quiet awful anticipation of catastrophe in “Embroidery.” The experience was refreshing – it was a gust of the proverbial second wind.
I needed that second wind. Over the course of my two years writing every day, my motivation had flagged. Especially as I hit the thickets of junior year of college, I found myself finishing fewer stories, making more “exceptions” for days when I had done a lot of writing for assignments, or filling up pages with complaints about how late it was and how I had no ideas. Discipline had fanned the flames at first; but now that the flames had died, it was exhausting to keep fanning up the ashes. The wind had fallen. To continue mixing metaphors promiscuously, my ship had drifted into the calms.
Columbia is a campus of many calms. Think of the motivation you might have possessed as a freshman, just entering college; think of the unusual zeal that seizes many of us at the beginning of semesters, convincing us that we will be able to rearrange our sleep schedules drastically in order to make those 8:40 classes (perhaps I project too much). Think of where you are now, and how – making it safely past the rocks of midterms – your ship may well have drifted into a season of calm, with nary a gust of wind in sight.
Sometimes we keep ourselves going a surprisingly long time, rowing with the oars of discipline and habit. And discipline is undeniably important, and it is a quality that Columbia students have in no small share. Were we to give up the moment our felt passion flagged, we would hardly accomplish anything of moment. But if we do not row ourselves to a place where the wind picks up again, we will inevitably tire ourselves out.
Finally I come to the point of this admittedly rambling essay, which is to remind students whose motivation may have departed; whose Muse may seem to have deserted them; whose ship has long been stranded in an empty sea, that if Columbia is a place of frequent calms, it is also a wonderful place to catch a second wind. Whatever inspires you, there is an opportunity here to recapture it. Think back to the flurry of names that were mentioned at the start of your time here, or that your friends – those friends who always seem to be going to things – like to mention – the Arts Initiative, Urban New York, all of those. Look into them. Don’t ignore those emails from housing or from your department – skim through them at least. You never know what you’ll find. Sometimes all it takes is a deliberate walk around campus with the determination not to think about classes or clubs or the next thing due, and then the sudden sight of the sky breaking out between the trees is a slight gust, the tail end of a breeze going in the right direction.
This advice applies not only to those who are stuck, but also to those who are pottering along grandly, for we all slow down eventually. It’s said that Ernest Hemingway – another daily writer – would leave off his writing for the day just when he knew what was going to happen next, so that he always had somewhere to pick back up from the next day. Stop just before the end of your rope, and you’ll have something to hold on to when the work starts up again.
So go – go to a museum, or go walk down the street from the opposite direction than you’re used to. Go grab tickets to a show you’ve been meaning to see. Go catch a sunray from a different angle, and feel the sails fill up again. And if you’re sailing along at a fine clip already, go sail in search of a second wind.