Yesterday was Ash Wednesday with its unfortunate intersection with Valentine’s Day. Maybe the message was that death and love are not that far apart. For everything we abandon during Lent, we should adopt something new. We die to one thing so that the new can be born. The new should be about love.
Last year I abandoned alcohol, a trite discipline. How many others did the same? I am sorry to say there was no permanent effect on my behavior. I just went on a cruise and had a ball trying out mixed drinks. It was a Mardi Gras abandonment of my previous discipline of one drink per day. Got a little sick, because of the sugar in the mixed drinks, but recovered as soon as I came home and stopped drinking for three days.
This year I’m abstaining from angry writing, a much more challenging discipline. I plan to take up constructive, hopeful, healing writing. Hopefully not naive, pollyanna writing, because I still want to write well. I just want to give up the righteous indignation that pervades too much of my writing.
For example,
The “Something Rotten” Conspiracy Principle” is a good example of angry writing. It is political; most of my political writing is angry. I may have a few constructive political posts, but usually my political writing has an edge.
Other kinds of writing can be angry. My baseball writing usually is some kind of rant. Lately I’ve been complaining about the Cardinals’ lack of initiative to sign another top-flight pitcher, like Jordan Montgomery. I was so incensed I got on X (Twitter) and sent a rant to @MozekiakJohn. I doubt he was fazed by it. And sadly, I’m still angry about it.
That is the problem with angry writing. It does not always relieve the pressure of anger. It is a temporary relief from some annoyance, which continues to fester afterwards. Sometimes you get it out of your system, but often not.
Really there’s nothing wrong with angry writing, but in the larger perspective it does not make you a better person. So I relent. Get it? Re-Lent.
I have some experience with more reflective writing. For example, I wrote about idols yesterday, and whether Taylor Swift was one. It wasn’t really angry, but more like inquiry. What does the Bible, especially Jesus, say about “idolatry”? I concluded that Taylor Swift was not an idol, but a passion, the same as any hero worship in sports, art or history. Probably hero worship can get out of control, especially when you create a shrine in your bedroom and commence worshipping at it, but that was not my point.
So maybe I’ll call this “reflective writing without the edge.” If you look past my political, sports and education writing you’ll find happier topics like “Travel,” “Memoir,” “Faith Stories,” “Spiritual, “Humor,” although Humor can be edgy. Be careful, Bill.
My writing should become more hopeful, reflective, even objective. Will it last after Lent? We’ll see. There is a place for anger in writing, just not the center-place. That is my ultimate goal. Reform, not perpetual abstinence. Stay tuned, if you can stand the hope.