Guest Post: Andrew
COPING WITH GUILT
For quite some time there has been some nameless pressure defying my creative instinct, some unholy weight denying my fingers the ability to write. Blog editors text me constantly, “Where is the guest post?” “Guest post now!” – yet even such demanding T-Bombs don’t help to get the creative juices flowing. The world needs me, needs my words, needs its new age bard - this I already know. Yet simply knowing brought me nowhere. I needed to plumb deeper into the depths of my soul if I was ever to dislodge the unholy writers block jamming up my creative instinct.
To do so, I consulted the designated grief counselor at my place of employment (who also happens to be the porter), named Chubbs. I explained my difficult position to Chubbs over a cup of Green Mountain Coffee, which, in case you didn’t know, punches nickel sized holes in your stomach with every sip.
“Well Andrew,” Chubbs said after listening to my dilemma, “in my estimation no one personifies the convergence of vacant and debased Protestant morality and existential anxiety better than you, so it only seems natural that you might have some reservations in sharing your writing with others, and that you might carry some guilt for not being able to do so effectively.”
“No shit, Chubbs,” I told the fucking idiot janitor. “But how do I cope?”
Finally Chubbs told me something useful. He explained a technique used by psychologists called inverse admission. It requires one to think deeply about the things one does not feel guilty about in order to analyze the difference between what society makes us feel guilty about, and what we, as individuals, actually feel guilty about. Chubbs suggested that I make a list, and scribbled out this personal list as an example to help me get thinking.
CHUBBS EXAMPLE:
I DO FEEL GUILTY about having eaten at least one of every variety of delicious snack cake offered in Entemann’s leisure foods line during the course of the past week
However,
I DO NOT FEEL GUILTY about fashioning all of the snack cakes into one giant, edible Ente-Mann to keep me company and comfort me before I consume him
Because it makes me feel fat and gay.
According to Chubbs, this example illustrates the difference between two kinds of guilt. Chubbs knows that he, as an individual, feels guilty for his inability to control his outrageous snack cake habit, driven by his inhuman hunger for baked goods. However, Chubbs feels that it is only the pressure of society which makes him feel guilty for trying to build a life sized cake man to satisfy his homo-erotic and hunger related desired in one [disgusting] session.
Chubbs is fucking crazy. None-the-less, in the absence of any other advice, I gave his technique a try. And I know, I know that you would love to see my lists guys. I already know. But I can’t show them to you. Too much culpability floating around out there for that bullshit.
What I can do is tell you my conclusions. Society makes me feel guilty for not sharing my genius on a regular basis. This is some thing I have to live with, my private, brilliant burden. However there is something that I do feel guilt for as an individual, a debt which supersedes both my desire for privacy and the demands of an uncaring public.
Luke, I owe you a radio show. And this is something I can never give back to you.
So here is what I can promise you. In your pre-posthumous honor, I am declaring the second full week of August “Andrew Week” on the Lucas 3 Stacks Blog. What does that mean? Well America [Hamden], that means for the second week of August, starting today, August 11th, you can expect a new guest post from yours truly – every, yes, EVERY day.
In other words: the flour I robbed you is gone Luke, and I’m sorry for that. But I used it to bake America’s bread. Now let’s eat.
