DEAR DIARY | THE WRITER'S LIFE
Being an optimist or a pessimist makes no difference to the outcome (especially if you subscribe to predeterminism) but the optimist has a better time leading up to it. That's one of a few philosophies which have helped me over the last four years.
It was almost four years ago now that I first found myself sitting in McDonald's, with a school exercise book and a bookmaker's pen, starting to write notes. When I look at what's happened since, it was optimism and activism which got me through.
It's only in the last few months that I've had the security of a rolling tenancy with a social landlord (having passed a “probationary” first year). I had to work for what I now have, and it was optimism and a determination to better my lot that got me here. Having spent three months street homeless, a further six months in a squat, seven months sofa-surfing, then a year crammed into an illegal, overcrowded flat above a crooked landlord's pub, I feel I've earned my modest but comfortable life.
Those early notes made up the oldest entries on this blog, as I'd go to the library for an hour a day to type them up. Then some of them formed the basis for my first novel: A semi-autobiographical flash fiction tale of a man, looking for answers among lost souls, while dealing with personal demons. Fast forward three years and I've published an anthology, an award-winning children's book, and soon a second novel. My current typewriter is the year-old laptop my mum gave me (“I thought it might help with your writing”). My studio, in this tranquil little village, is just up the road from where George Orwell once lived. It's all rather splendid. I earned it, I was optimistic, and I worked hard to get where I am. Temporarily at least, I'm happy. But I'm also restless.
Normally, happy people make shit activists: They lack the restlessness which drives change. A world full of them would be a passive and complicit place. But it's being a commentator and occasional activist which makes me happy and was partly responsible for getting me where I am. And besides, peaceful civil disobedience is fun.
Sometimes when I was homeless, I wished I was a dog, because then life wouldn't be so complicated. Dogs have such low expectations of life: Take them for a walk, throw a stick, or open a packet of biscuits, and a dog is happy. They've got every day nailed. But I'm restless; I question things: If I throw a stick for a dog, is the dog perhaps bringing it to me because he's humouring me by playing along at what he thinks is my favourite game? In some ways, dogs are anarchists, depending on one's understanding of the term.
Like my particular brand of atheism (I don't deny the possibility of superior beings, I deny God in man's image), my anarchism is refined beyond the stereotype of chaos often used to depict anarchy.
My conventional political standing is one of liberal socialism, but I see how that can be just one small remove from communism. My anarchism has its basis in the works of Naom Chomsky, who defines anarchy as “...a tendency in human thought which shows up in different forms in different circumstances, and has some leading characteristics. Primarily it is a tendency that is suspicious and sceptical of domination, authority, and hierarchy. It seeks structures of hierarchy and domination in human life over the whole range, extending from, say, patriarchal families to, say, imperial systems, and it asks whether those systems are justified. It assumes that the burden of proof for anyone in a position of power and authority lies on them. Their authority is not self-justifying. They have to give a reason for it, a justification. And if they can’t justify that authority and power and control, which is the usual case, then the authority ought to be dismantled and replaced by something more free and just. And, as I understand it, anarchy is just that tendency. It takes different forms at different times.” Anarchy is people working together, where exploration and discovery aren't suppressed or monetised. Dogs do that really well.
What I've achieved over the last four years, I've achieved by working with the system, learning how it works and respecting those who work within it. I can't help thinking though, that it all would have been a lot quicker if those people weren't employed by government.
Life is like a jigsaw puzzle: All the pieces fit together eventually. But if you follow convention and complete the edges first, you'll finish the puzzle too quickly. Think differently.
Cyrus Song will be published on or before 17.08.17.
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