Burnt

Mungkin agaknya sudah penat.

Atau mungkin sebab aku rasa tak fresh lagi.





Aku ada niat nak berhenti menulis buat seketika. Insya-Allah lepas ini, lepas buku baru aku keluar (tatau la bila, tapi dalam tahun ni la, kata editor), aku nak berhenti menulis sekejap. Sekejap tu aku tak tahu sampai bila. Mungkin dua tiga tahun. Mungkin lebih cepat, atau mungkin lebih lama.

Bukan sebab aku kering idea. Dalam otak aku ada banyak idea. Macam-macam. Inside, outside, tepi, tengah, belakang, bawah box sume ada.

Tapi sebab aku rasa tak fresh. Dulu bila menulis, aku rasa seronok. Aku seronok share idea, aku seronok do all those "jengjengjeng...TWIST!" kind of thing. Tapi sejak akhir-akhir ni, twist feels stale. The industry itself feels stale to me. It was the same thing. Tulis. Edit. Publish. Jual. Sign buku. Baca review. Somehow amid all that, aku dah lupa keseronokannya.

Mungkin sebab dulu, masa aku menulis, aku fikir nak bagi orang terhibur dengan apa yang aku tulis, to make them feel that they're not alone in whatever it is they are going through. There was no need to compete, to make sure buku tu terjual dengan banyak, there was no need to worry about the economy, about TV adaptations, what else I should do to sell my craft. But the more you grow, the older you get, writing a book is no longer just for the sake of writing stories. It's about sales, it's about survival, it's about entering a world where there is competition all around. And in order to survive, you have to wear white in the sea of white.

Somehow, cita-cita aku yang dulunya "penulis novel yang ada kerja sampingan lain" dah bertukar. Kerja sampingan yang lain tu dah jadi kerja tetap, dan menulis novel dah jadi sampingan sebab I need to live and writing a book just doesn't cut it. It doesn't pay the bills. I used to not care about the money, and cherish the excitement of telling stories. But even telling stories doesn't excite me anymore.

I will find my way. I will make my return. Maybe sooner than anybody expected. But for now, aku nak berenti sekejap. Aku dah 32 tahun. Aku perlu ada hala tuju. I am sick of the same love story. Kalau tak, aku akan continue spewing the same thing over and over again because the market is like that, and my readers will just say, "She's burnt out".

Aku berborak dengan seorang fellow writer yang juga dah mula rasa bosan menulis, yang nak tulis sesuatu yang lebih daripada apa yang dia biasa tulis. Tapi katanya it's like trying to do a stand-up comedy dalam Maharaja Lawak. You can make the funniest commentary about the socio-political situation of the world, but in the end orang gelak gila tengok pelawak yang pakai baju perempuan.

Hmmm....