Writing as a Response

I tend to wonder about my writing... why do I bother? I mean, what really is the point of writing?

The only theory I have is that, despite people not really liking it, I write as a response to everything that happens in my life. I have all these silly little poems on my Facebook page, because something in my life sparked the writing part of my brain. I write the little poems and the stories, sometimes, because it means I can say something without having to say it directly to people.

The more I think about it, the more sense that makes. The first book I ever wrote was when I was in third year; no real friends, no one to talk to. So I make a book with interesting people who were my age, have them go on a wild adventure chasing destiny and meaning and purpose, trying to fight off this grand evil that's pushed away the powers of good into nothingness.

The second book I wrote follows a writer who's not entirely there all the time. His head is fairly messed up; he has mental and emotional health problems, insecurities beyond measure... I was in sixth year, knowing what I wanted to do, but not sure how to get there, or if I'd like it so much when I got there.

The third book I wrote was Sci-Fi, filled with characters with super powers. Anyone see the point here? I was different. I was in fifth year when I started but I didn't finish it until after the second book. My characters were all aimed at one place. I think, and I'm really only theorising, they were like parts of me, all coming together when the book was finished. But that's not really what happened. I mean, the pieces all fall apart, anyway. The characters don't stay together. Really, if I wanted to keep all the bits of me together I wouldn't have finished the last couple of chapters.

This summer I wrote three novellas, and each one of them examined different parts of my life. They were rather less subtle than the other things I wrote, so I won't go into too much detail on them.

All the poems I write seem to be in response to an event, or maybe just a stray thought I have.

And that's kind of the point of me writing, isn't it? I mean, what other reason would I be writing for? I don't make money from my writing, I don't have a legion of fans waiting to see what story I'm going to tell them next. I don't have anything but the need to respond to life when it does something to make me write. Sometimes it makes me happy, sometimes it doesn't, but all the time I'm saying something I never could say in this globally experiences phenomenon known as "real life".

And maybe that's the problem. I don't keep my responses private, so yes: I respond quite verbally to the people who do things to get to me. I don't think I can ever stop that. I can't just quit writing, because I'd probably just go even crazier than I am, now. And I can't just quit people, because even the friends that drive me up the wall are too important to me to give up.

So I'm writing this as a response to that, to all the doubts they give me about everything in my life.

I have a purpose, even if you can't see it.