Masked Ball
After a two-week lay-off, the Dance of Colors returns. What caused the lay-off? Absolutely nothing. I grew tired of posting, of writing, of throwing my paint on the waters of the web and waiting to see what, if anything, happened. Well – nothing happened.
Steven King, On Writing, says “Paper your walls with rejections.” And I have done, pages and pages of them. The secret is ‘never surrender’ – ‘never give up’ – or, in the language of the WWII Prisoner of War Camps – Nil carborundum illegitimi. You can Google the meaning, if you can’t read Latin. It is a euphemism for ‘never despair’.
Rejection is one thing. Silence is something else. When I check my notebooks I find submissions, some sent several years ago, that are still unanswered. There is simply no response. It is as if the writer – submitter – does not exist, is not even worthy of a form letter.
I ran into that wall of silence during this two week lay-off. Does it matter? Probably not. The creation of art is as much a monologue as it is a dialogue. Bakhtin calls it ‘a creative artist’s dialogue with his time and place.’ I think of it as ‘this creative artist’s monologue with his time and place.’
Footsteps – I leave them here, I leave them there, you can find those footsteps anywhere. But beware the footsteps left on the beach at low tide. You will not find them on the beach the day after you leave them. The tide will have risen and washed them all away. In spite of that, some footprints are here to stay.
rogermoorepoet 
And yet the footsteps you have left are being followed by silent admirers who feel they will never be as talented as you are. So, write on, paint on, and keep sharing, and those of us who remain a bit too silent at times are learning
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Thank you so much, Ginger. That encourages me to keep taking those little footsteps onwards and upwards. Per ardua ad astra.
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I don’t read anything into nothing, Roger. Facebook followers and such have no collective modus operandi. In my posting experience, people don’t always react to posts when it’s snowy, raining, sunny, hot, cold, winter, summer, fall, spring, night, or day, though sometimes they do. They see, though; we’re all looky-lous, scrolling in our own puddle of numbness, but we don’t always have something to say. Say we’re speechless. Keep it up!
Jan Hull My sculptures websitehttps://www.thestoneist.com/ My author websitehttp://www.janfancyhull.com/ ________________________________
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You make some excellent points, Jan. Thank you. Occasionally we meet a fellow creative artist with whom we can hold a substantial and creative dialog, but more often than not, we indulge in artistic monologs that all too often vanish into the surrounding silence.
It was the same in academia – I rarely had feedback on my academic work. Yet it was read, people responded to it in their own articles, but the face to face was usually lacking. In depth dialog was very rare.
Even when I published articles on Transformative [Teaching] Dialogs, there was more monolog than dialog. I guess I missed the ‘cut and thrust’ of grad school when I chose to remain an undergraduate teacher.
It is a curious isolation, and it has grown more solitary with age and Post-Covid!
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Hullo, Roger, I thought this contribution (to the aether?) was thought-provoking and well-written. It made me think, always a wonderful thing. Lois and I have been–are–ill with a persistent cold this past while. We are hopefully on the mend as of this morning. We’ll see what the day brings. Being home, unable or unwilling to go out for days is an off-putting thing. I think it would be much worse if I *felt *like going out, but I do not. Your essay makes me see a correlation to my being stuck at home, unable to interact with people, and your having written something and not receiving any interaction from the reader. Just my opinion. I write books for sale. I can’t imagine (he said, smiling) why readers aren’t showing me they’ve read my books by the thousands each month. But they don’t. And I still write, because I can’t not. And here we are, doing our thing and not always receiving commensurate feedback. You write brilliantly, with depths and layers, with layers and allusions and humour. I can’t tell you that everyone reads you and want to send you contracts, but I know I read you. Stay healthy, Roger and Clare. Chuck
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Thank you for your reply, Chuck.
I think many friendships and relationships changed post-Covid. I know mine did.
I have several regular online correspondents, but friends ‘in the flesh’, so to speak, not that many.
The ageing factor doesn’t help either. As I get older, I go out less. I haven’t had my hair cut (professionally) since 2019. I do it all myself.
I went to a bar with Becky last summer, and it was one of my first bar outings since 2019. I may have eaten out four at restaurants or five times since 2019. Certainly I have not done so very often.
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