here is where blogging becomes

slightly uncomfortable: i want to write about something, but i don't necessarily want the party concerned to know it. and although i'm pretty sure he doesn't read any of this, it is on the internet and so i have to assume the possibility is always there. and here it is now - the responsibility that comes with clicking the "publish post" button, usually so neatly curbed by being obtuse in phrasing and intent.

but that kind of goes to the heart of what i want to write about, so i'm going to anyway. it won't be the end of the world. if anything, it might be a useful example just how awkward i feel about it.

so. someone gave me a script to read yesterday.

it was a first draft of something he'd written, based in large part on his own experience. this i already knew. what i didn't know was how far the project had developed, nor just how personal is was. and concidering that he was looking to me for professional feedback on his work, i settled in to read it quite innocently.

ok, i'll admit the first few pages didn't grab me right away. may have been my natural reserve toward something i knew was written from life, as scripts of that nature - first drafts especially - tend to have a handful of very obvious, very typical flaws. besides, i already knew the broad strokes of the plot and was guarding against what i perceived to be its weaknesses. who knows. all i can say is, i was completely thrown by my own reactions the further i got into it.

oh, i'm not saying the flaws and weaknesses weren't there - it was very much a first draft. it was far better than many first drafts i've read; the dramatic structure was solid, the storytelling flowed well, the supporting characters were all appropriately developed. but that's not it, that's not it at all.

you know that awkward feeling you get when you realize someone is using a funny anecdote as a thinly veiled metaphor for something really difficult to talk about? well, this was a gigantic stride beyond that. this was actually saying the very things a metaphor like that would try to obscure, without fanfare or embellishment. it was a story told in such plain terms and so honestly, it made me feel like a voyeur. it embarrassed me. it challenged my professional detachment from the script as a creative product and made me question whether i was at all able to be unbiased in my criticism of it.

because - and i'd like you to know that i use this expression exteremely conservatively - it spoke to me. it spoke to me. it looked me right in the eye and laughed at my discomfort and made me want to be impossibly brave. and the thing is that i hadn't expected this at all. not because i'm such a huge pro, i'm beyond being personally affected by stuff i read - i hope to god i'm never that jaded - but, well...
truthfully? because i never thought the guy who wrote this was going to go there.

i'm a little ashamed of making that judgment, yes. but it almost isn't even a question of depth or artistic integrity. it's just that no one goes there. seriously. no one i have ever known, anyway - and i have many friends who write. i have written scripts myself and even produced a couple, always wanting to say something that was personal and important - of course, why else would anyone write a script? certainly not for monetary gain. a part of you inevitably ends up in every story you tell, and it's just a matter of skill to weave it in gracefully and polish the edges where your ego pokes through.

and some people are great at that, writing deeply personal content that reads both honest and inspired. but always - at least in my experience - a successfully dramatized story based on autobiographical events has a filter of sorts, something to cushion the abrasiveness of real, raw, unstructured emotion. the benefit of writing is that you can guide perception, and the benefit of guiding perception is that you can talk about your own vulnerability without actually leaving yourself wide open and vulnerable.

i've never read anything - well, nothing that wasn't the sort of writing one does in journals meant for oneself only - quite this... vulnerable. quite this gutsy, maybe. and no, this isn't really a professional opinion. this is me feeling shaken by how readily this writer put himself on the line, and by how painfully deeply i identified with many of the not-so-pretty sides of his story, and by how terrified i would be to share myself in that way.

maybe jealous, too. of the grace with which he was able to surrender himself to the script, when i don't even have the grace to do it in real life. before i was three-quarters through reading, my skin was crawling. by the time i reached the last page, i was tearing up with frustration and the craving for catharsis of some sort... the character's predicament was getting to me so much i couldn't stand it.

and i resented knowing how true it all was. i would have been so comforted thinking it was fiction.

so, in the end, i can't actually give a professional opinion. i am too involved. the story is too real to me. and almost without meaning to, i realize why i feel like i've been kicked in the gut by the honesty of his writing: i've lost the ability to deal with words that address too directly. naked, stark words for naked, stark feelings. i'm too used to distilling emotions into academic dissertations or diluting them into abstract poetry. i make things complicated, always excusing this with "...because they are."

but really, they are not. i just lack the courage to face them and handle the fallout.