Anatomy Of My Writing

I've been thinking a lot recently about that scene in Anatomy of a Fall. The one where the husband and wife, both writers, are arguing in their kitchen. By this stage in the film, we already know that he is miserable. His wife is a published, in-demand author, while he’s resigned himself to the role of house husband. Doing school pickups and homework sessions in the shadow of her success. Bitter, even, to the point that, in another scene, he obnoxiously plays an instrumental cover of P.I.M.P. (nice) at full volume to disrupt a magazine interview she’s taking in the living room below. In the kitchen scene, he sits with his elbows leaning on their counter, his hair disheveled, the light gone out of his eyes. He looks almost manic, blaming the limitations his wife’s ambitions have placed on his own. Refusing to take the bait, she mentions his pride and total aversion to failure. How her success has nothing to do with it. Those two things, she reckons, were enough to stop him from ever amounting to anything. 

That scene, lowkey, triggered me. 

I was sitting in the cinema, beside a guy I’ve been seeing for a few months. I thought about how this guy is a musician. He records and releases music for people to resonate with. He puts the time and effort into marketing himself and getting his name out there. He turns ideas into something tangible. I, on the other hand, am a writer that peaked with a job at a high-profile magazine at 23. The one who took a full-time job in copywriting, and tells people “yes, I still write on the side!” when really that means writing diary entries into my gmail drafts about getting ghosted because I’m too afraid to put anything out in my own name. If we were to be the husband and wife in this scenario, I imagined, he would be the strong, formidable Sandra Huller. The person that works hard and pulls things out of the ether and into public view. And I would be the husband. All ideas but no get up and go. The lazy, bitter writer that I am. 

As we walked out of the cinema, I squinted up at my date in the dark of the January cold and asked whether he thought the two writers wanted to be parents. He looked down at me smiling and said, “Well, you’re the writer. What do you think?”  My face went hot.  Sorry, why the fuck did he say it like that? Is he being patronising? Why say “you’re the writer” when we both know that I’m not really? Or at least haven’t been. Not properly, for a while. 

I felt a sudden impulse to open my mouth and quip back something sharp. Instead, I took a deep breath in, and then out, watching this attempt at staying serene turn into a grey fog in the winter night, evaporating before my nose could even make contact with it. I thought about his question calmly, rationally. I realised it was just that: a question. My inferiority complex had misleadingly laced it with a condescending tone. He was, actually, just being nice.

I think much of the reason why I put off trying to publish my writing is because I hate the fact that I can’t write about anything that isn’t from my own experience. I can’t seem to make up characters the same way other writers do, or fantasy worlds. Or turn letters into lyrics whose sentiments can be drowned out by a nice base line or guitar riff. I’m not creative enough to hide in my writing the way other people can. So when I write, I have to write about living in London and that woman I saw trying to defend a swan in St James Park by throwing an alarmingly big stick at another swan that was attacking it. And, sometimes, it’s whichever guy I’m seeing. 

And I fucking hate it. 

I hate the idea of one of their friends sending them a link and saying, “She’s keen…” I hate the fact that I’m letting go of my pride by insinuating that they’ve probably taken up more space in my head than I have in theirs. But when I really think about it, it’s never actually about who I’m seeing. It’s about what our interactions teach me about myself. About how I want to move forward after our names stop popping up on each other's screens altogether. When I first moved to London, lonely after a break up and knowing only one friend, I ended up dating a guy who grew up here. He had all the mates around him that I was used to having in Ireland. He never worried about what each weekend would look like, filled with birthdays and impromptu nights out and bike rides. I constantly drew comparisons between his full calendar and my perpetual lack of plans or basic feeling of belonging. I wanted what he had, so badly. 

Looking back, it’s strange that I was so taken with him. I could’ve tried to connect with any of the others who, like me, were new to London. I think I was trying to do the zen mind-work of following my envy, but went left instead of right. It felt easier to look at him and see a solution in the friendships he’d already created. Welcomed in and going on their curated nights out, rather than putting in the hard graft of making my own mates. And in some ways, I’m doing it again. There’s some primal instinct telling me that I’m better off just observing other people’s creativity than digging deep within myself to nurture my own. I think, if I’m being honest, I’m scared. Because doing that means having to show a lot more of who I am than they have to. They can turn their emotions into a nice enough beat that people dance and sweat and fistbump to. They don’t have to stand naked and bear it all the way I would. But that’s not to say that they don’t feel naked, putting those things out. By making that claim, I’m projecting my fear again. I’m making up excuses not to write. 

I was sitting outside the airport Pret the other week, £16 down (suitably) and listening to a Brene Brown podcast. At one point she says that the only thing people can offer to the world, that is 100% unique, is their creativity. Everyone has their own form of it. Whether it’s how you come up with recipes or teaching lessons for kids. Or even thinking up new ways to hide your dog’s medicine in food so they actually take it. 

I think, for me, it’s stringing together nice sentences about my own life experiences. And what they teach me about trying to get out of bed every day with purpose when I’d rather stay buried under the covers. I hope at some point this evolves. Maybe, eventually, I’ll even develop characters or alternate worlds. Like that bit in Everything Everywhere All at Once where Michelle Yeoh and Jamie Lee Curtis look like themselves but have hot dogs for fingers. Who wouldn’t want to see more of that? 

But for now, it’s the dates I go on and how I fill in the space that’s left after they’re over. It’s about my friendships and what they’ve taught me about fucking up and forgiving and always trying. A creative retelling of things we all go through that could, hopefully, help or resonate with other people. There’s a part of me that feels like if I don’t at least put the work into getting it out there, I’ll end up feeling bitter. My elbows on the kitchen counter looking up at a person I love deeply, but whose success I resent. Everything I need to feel fulfilled is already here within me. I just need to pull it out and turn it into something.

Niamh is a Belfast-born content creator currently based in London. She has written for the likes of Marie Claire and the Irish Independent.

Recently, she launched her own Substack. Here, she writes about little things she notices about living in the hope to resonate with other people. To join as a *free* subscriber, visit buckdaft | Niamh Katrina | Substack.