hmm, i've been reading (what's new?) this really hilarious book called 'dress your family in corduroy and denim' by david sedaris. i mean, seriously, it's too funny to even be read in public. i'd be afraid to be taken as a complete nutcase. it is an amalgamation of stories that happen in just about any average regular family but are told in such a cynical and sarcastic way that it is simply brilliant. while reading this, though, i started thinking about how it would be possible for my brother and i to write similar stories about our parents. not that our parents are in any way special or anything, but maybe it is precisely the way in which they are like every other parents that make them interesting.

but then, at one point i started questioning the actual purpose of documenting those stories years later and, probably, about the much larger aim of writing in general. the famous 'so what' question that our research methods prompted us with and the 'who's your audience' that our teaching writing prof would instantly pop out.

but, really, who is my audience? as far as i know, i've been religiously typing away almost on a daily basis for years and i can not provide an answer that could justify either the time spent or the space consumed by those ions sent adrift in this sea of information. i sometimes scribble down notes as i'm about to go to bed about stuff i need to write about - it always seems brilliant at the time when these ideas come up - but what is all the briliantness in the world worth if you never really share it with anyone.

is writing always meant to be shared? should it be seen as a personal process? i'm sure it means different things to different people and you could argue that there is no right answer to these questions... but i always wonder how different of a person i would be had i not read this book or that book. had the author not decided to make his / her writing public. and maybe there are thousands of books out there that i ought to read but have yet to be published or translated in a language i can pretend to understand for a minute or two.

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i've read this beautiful poem by Souvankham Thammavongsa and i think it ought to be shared - oh boy, i think i answering my own question in the blurb above!

A Tangerine

is an orange
deferred

It fits into you
but a palm
must open, fingers close

It will never grow
awkard
with limbs heavy, skin think

It will stay
like this,
small, deferred
and will ask
why
it has not yet filled out

You will have
no answers
will only pack
two
in a brown paper bag;
one, for yourself
and the other
an offering
not yet made