Words

When I was 14 years-old, in 8^th grade, I had an English teacher who I did not appreciate at the time, but who did a lot for me, in ways that I only saw later. He once gave my class a challenge to write a paper that would explain to someone else the instructions to tie a shoe. He said that anyone who wrote a paper that could be followed to the letter, and end with a tied shoe, would receive an “A” for the quarter. I relished the way this challenge made me think intensely about every word I put on paper. I tied a shoe, stopping at every step to write down what was being done, so I could use written words to describe the exact process. I knew I was incapable of vocally describing such an act to anyone, but I was comfortable in believing I could successfully describe such a task on paper in a way that would help another human understand what I was trying to convey. The teacher had different students come up in front of class to try and follow the instructions of every paper written, as the papers were read aloud, to see if the instructions in each paper could help someone tie a shoe. A student named Monty was the one who followed the words of my paper, as it was read. At the end of the reading of my paper, Monty had tied his shoe. I was the only student in that class whose paper ended this way. I knew something very important at that moment:  if I could find a way to convey something real in written words, I could successfully communicate with another human.

This same English teacher made us write daily journals. He had us name our journals, the way Anne Frank named her diary “Kitty.” I named my journal “Sigh Lentz,” and told my teacher this meant I was supposed to remain silent, so I did not need to keep a daily journal. He told me that the name was great, which meant I needed to write “Two” pages a day, instead of just one. I still have some of those journals I wrote many decades ago. I look at them now, and can hear my teenage self, testing the waters, trying to see if anyone would listen to the words dying to leak out of me. I was too young, and way too messed up, to write the things that I truly needed to release, but I did get to use those journals to learn quite a bit about written communication. I already knew that I was meant to write things, I just had no idea who would ever be safe, and trustworthy enough, to read such words.

I have written a lot, ever since I wrote my first poem (http://sighlentz.blogspot.com/2015/09/fiction.html) when I was around eight or nine. Most of those words had never been seen by anyone.  Unfortunately, my childhood education was severely stunted by the stress I was under, so my ability to convey English in its proper written form is far from correct.

Starting 8 years ago, I took some college courses, including a handful of English classes where a wonderful instructor taught me a lot, and got the first story I wrote for her class published. The experience was amazing, opening a new world of communication for me, and giving me quite a bit more knowledge about the horribly complex rules of written English words. (I SO wish I was fluent in a language like Spanish, because my blog would be full of a lot less mistakes if I could write it in a language that made any damn sense...) 

[Edited on Sept 5, 2023, to say that while taking this college course, it was assumed I had learned the basics about the English language.  After all, I did graduate high school in 1984.   My English professor was later surprised to realize I knew nothing about sentence structure, and couldn't identify nouns or adjectives or anything to do with the basics of writing.  For me, writing is like playing guitar.  I play what I hear, but can't read a damn note. End of edit]

This past year, I shared some of my darkest words with another human.  It did not turn out well. 

Technology is dicey, and written words about dark truths can be dangerous. I always knew my darkest words were not something that just anyone could hear. Monty could tie that shoe way back in 8^th grade, because he was totally open to just listening to my words, and no one else was interfering. Real life is not some classroom. It is humans, each of whom is dysfunctional in some way, doing their thing to accomplish whatever they want to accomplish. I think this is why I like communicating with other species. Human communication is too complicated for me to ever grasp.

I love words. I love writing. I hate words. I hate writing.

Written words saved me. And destroyed me.

A bit ago, I stepped outside to watch the space station fly over. I have signed up for notifications from NASA (https://spotthestation.nasa.gov/signup.cfm) so I can watch as various humans orbit our earth, in a dance that involves very important communication between human-created machines, computers, and instruments, as well as an understanding of physic's laws that humans have discovered and communicated to others over centuries, and communication between those handful of humans on the space station, and a ground crew willing and able to listen and communicate in response. I think of each human up there as I watch them fly over, and wonder who it was in their lives that gave them the support every human requires to accomplish anything good humans are capable of accomplishing. I wish everyone could be supported, and communicated with, in a way that brought out the good each human is born capable of accomplishing. Humans are capable of so much good. And so much bad.

This past year has healed me. And devastated me.

And written words will always be the only release I know.