I haven’t felt like writing for a while now. I know I’ve mentioned the idiocy of holding to a fixed schedule. I hope I never get over feeling amazed, because people actually read my stories. While in the midst of a rare, weekly break, I suffered a major personal loss. 

It’s like the emotional music stops and all you hear is silence. 

When creativity and a job start getting confused, you’ve got yourself a problem. I am thinking about myself. Posting a story every week started losing momentum. Obligation and spontaneity don’t get on very well. Throw in a dose of neurosis and you have a confused old Jew.

I certainly have my share of habits and I am being kind. I know I have written before that I could give Rain Man a run for his money. Writing becoming a chore is about the last place I’d want to shove it. Yeah, I know the last thing a reader wants to read is about the angst of the writer. Don’t get nervous, I am not about launch into some kind of self-pathetic admission about the challenges to my creativity. 

I think the combination of a major league, personal loss falling in the midst of a fallow period of self-exploration is an accident of circumstance and not some pre-determined exercise in life’s poetry. How I choose to deal is what matters. 

I was getting tired of feeling like a writer and maybe enjoying the compliments a little too much. I am not too bad at turning a phrase every now and then. A young friend of mine pointed out that I seem to often apologize for my attempt at writing. Personally, I think humility can be easily construed as self-deprecating commentary, which I swear is not what I mean. However, that could also be what’s bothering me when I sense too much authority in my tone. 

It feels like I have been looking for some kind of reset in my stories. As soon as I have posted one, I am immediately thinking about what to do next. In a way, these stories have not been about me, they always start with some external circumstance and then I have tried to make them about me. Publishing a story every week slowly began to become as important as the story itself. 

I don’t claim to have any responsibility about what happens in our lives. I don’t know if there is someone in charge of all this shit. I am always a big fan of karma, especially when it involves some asshole, hoping he will get what he deserves in his lifetime. While that is wishful thinking, we are all living in our private classrooms and lessons are there for the taking.

So, what do I do with a very painful, personal loss? I could easily become extremely angry about how it was handled. The saddest part for me was being excluded from everything relating to this child’s passing. A couple of weeks ago, I was asked why I sit and what has it done for me? I was really stuck for an answer, thinking I should at least be able to site one thing. Before getting into trouble, it was asked lovingly.

I sat with that question for quite a while, because it was really a good one. After well over thirty years of cushion sitting, what do I have to show for it? I am certainly no poster child for a person of unlimited integrity and compassion. It’s funny, a lot of thinking about all this stuff is that you somehow become a better person. “Well, you know he has had a Zen practice for years and that explains it.? 

I tell you what? You can read all the crap you want about this ancient practice and it doesn’t make you a better person. The answer to that question for me is that I am Larry Feinstein, partially as a result of parking my ass on a cushion for all these years. I am not any better or worse because of it. I am the guy writing this to you, whether on a cushion or a desk chair. 

We are victims of our expectations. The idea that others are wrestling with their own demons doesn’t seem to temper our responses. It is always about us first and the other is secondary. Amongst other things, anger is an incredible shield, masking us from our own feelings. The hurt comes before the anger and while you can’t numb the pain, you can drop a sheet over the mirror of your suffering, blinding yourself from the truth.

Mourning the loss of a loved one is a life long process. Happily for you, you will not be subject to a weekly lament regarding the nature of life, etc. I don’t really know where that is going to find a home. So far, these past mornings, we have sat together on the cushion. I want his journey to be  peaceful, because that boy has suffered enough in this life. 

So, what the hell am I going to do about this writing business? I remember the first night I sat down to supposedly begin my memoir to my grandson. I had never written before, not like that anyway. I was a word explorer, navigating on creative waters I had never encountered before. I kind of feel the same way now. 

The major difference between that first night so many years ago is that I am still right here. I have never left the white screen, like a soul siren, calling out to me. I know this is a tough time for so many of us and it wouldn’t feel right to leave you wordless. No, I am not here to make you feel better, just here to make you feel.

I am grateful to all of you, truly grateful.

May God be with you on your journey, Danny.

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