I know I haven't been writing much this year. Somehow near the end of 2008, I began to lose my writing mojo. It was the first time I was actively writing SOMETHING on a daily basis. This seemed to coincide with the onset of a relationship that has now ended. I was hoping my desire to write would come back, and in a mild way it has, but I have to admit that only 2 weeks ago I was thinking of officially closing down this blog for good. I thought maybe Bunniblog had run its course, and if I decided to blog again, I needed to re-envision the site and my goals. As it was Bunniblog has gone through many incarnations, originally intended just to be a way to help my friends keep up with what was going on without having to send out a thousand emails, it later became a place for me to showcase a range of different types of writing (film reviews, personal essay, literary analysis). It also allowed me to write about my frustrations with dating-from dating websites just plain old bad dates. I thought maybe why I wasn't posting on Bunniblog anymore might have to do with an identity crisis, and new blog with a clearer goal would be the best way to carry on.

And then came the most soul crushing ending to the year ever. 10 years ago when my life fell apart, one of the ways I rationalized pushing on was to think "Listen if this is worst, it can only get better, right?" Yes, a person who survived cancer and an insane father only to be dumped by her fiance two weeks after September 11th should know better than to tempt the Fates like, because just when you think you can go any lower, someone hands you a shovel. Quite simply, this year seemed hell bent on teaching me just how much worse things can get-and now I'm not 26, I'm 35. 35 and unmarried and cynical and depressed. And a lot of the not writing anymore comes from the loss of a belief I held for so very long. The belief that not only did I have something worthy to say, but that people wanted to hear it. But I lost my confidence slowly that my writing had any kind of merit, and then sank into even more despair believing even if it DID, no one wanted to read it. And then this belief spilled into my inability to connect with people.

Talking to people has always been something I excelled at. My father considered it quite a gift that I could converse enjoyably with just about anyone. As I've gotten older, this ability has faded more and more. Now I find myself contributing to conversations that seem to awkwardly stop. Thus my feelings of absolute isolation, of being so unintelligible that I'm no longer even a real person prevail.

It is for this reason I think the novel Frankenstein has such a strong resonance for me-a Creature (as he is most consistently referred to as such and never given a name by his creator Victor) is rejected by all, even his creator. They do not acknowledge any shared humanity with this "thing" even though he shows not just physical, but intellectual and ethical superiority. (If you read the book, the Creature learns languages quickly and repeated helps and saves others who respond only with the violence.) In the end, after giving up all hope of finding even one person to be his friend, he drives his creator to die and walks into the snow. (There are two different versions. One ending is more ambiguous about whether or not the Creature dies. After all, since he made of reanimated tissue and is so physically superior to human beings, there is a question about whether he CAN die and if so, how that act could be brought about. The movie Subject Two actually a really compelling modern version of the story.)

It's difficult when these moments occur to know if it's the depression speaking or the rational mind. Perhaps there isn't much of a difference.

At the moment, I'm at a crisis point. Something drastic must change because I simply can't do this for another 10 years. I'm going to start by trying to write more regularly and pulling up old work in order to get published. I also have to write on my literary essays as I can't put grad school off another year even if my GRE scores are eating with the dirigibles. Of course, I've been saying this for years so I have to find a way to make myself actually do it.

The problem is I don't like the person I have become. I've become bitter. I've always been a passionate person and that translates often into anger, but I've not been bitter. Now, I fear I'm only a few crows feet away from being a caricature of woman in a bar with a martini cursing at all these happy couples. I don't want to become this. What I want is to become confident again in my writing, I want to feel connected with people again instead of feeling like a constant outsider-the Creature sitting unseen watching the happy peasants and longing to be with them and knowing this is not at all possible.

So I will be posting my latest travelogue here. Hopefully you will read it and like it and comment on it because honestly I could use all the emotional support I can dig up and find.