One day I sat down and wrote the first chapter of what I hoped would become my breakthrough novel. I have always been an exceptionally fast typist-for an uncoordinated, hunt-and-peck wreck. Diligently stabbing here and there, index finger extended, I can reach the awe-inspiring pace of thirty words a minute. My reading pace is fifteen times that. I have entirely too much time to read what I write. Sometimes this gap slows me, or stops me altogether, as doubt overwhelms me. Today, it didn't.

A chapter is a lot of work; compounded by my sloth, multiplied by my chaotic creative process, a mere ten pages balloons into an undertaking greater than Hannibal crossing the Alps, and with more casualties. But I sat there and made myself do it. I stared at the computer screen until my eyes watered; I chose each word carefully and deliberately, forming them into sentences designed to capture the mind and delight the eye. I poured my heart into the draft, hoping to lay the beginnings of a powerful, moving novel.

When at last the chapter came to a close, I sat back in relief - and concern. It seemed brilliant, but I had just finished writing it. Though my instinct trumpeted praise, consciously I knew my work was riddled with errors. But my stupidity wouldn't be apparent unless I let the chapter sit for a week, and in the flush of excitement I simply couldn't wait. So I pasted the entire body of text into an e-mail, and sent it out to several friends of mine who'd promised, at one point or another, to critique my work.

Some time passed; return e-mails trickled into my inbox gradually. Some took hours, some took days. I shouldn't have bothered waiting - every e-mail resembled the others, and they all said the same thing: "Looks good, I can't see anything wrong with it off the top of my head." It seemed like glowing praise, coming from so many people with such little variation, but it only depressed me.

The first rule of writing, as I'm fond of quoting, is: "Nine-tenths of everything you write will be crap." This applies all the more so to first drafts. I knew I had made mistakes; some things must sound contrived, others inaccurate, others just plain wrong; but what were they? And why couldn't anyone else see them?

The answer came to me with sudden abruptness. No one had invested themselves in my manuscript. My impromptu review board read it simply to read it, simply because I had asked. If I bound fifty more chapters like it into a novel and slapped it on a shelf, none of them would glance twice at it. Their praise was the most damning criticism of all. Not one person felt one way or another about the work. People always notice the flaws in things they like best, or least; that my friends saw none in mine implied that it was merely boring.

My enthusiasm dissipated. I returned to television, apologizing to it for my absence by watching four hours of movies in one night. I squirreled the chapter away in the depths of my hard drive; the promise I made to myself, to return to it soon and rebuild it, was similarly squirreled away in some back corner of my mind and swiftly forgotten.

I want superpowers. Not something sissified like turning into stone, or mundane X-ray vision. I want the full package - incredible strength and speed, flight, nigh-invulnerability - the kind of superpowers that would flatten a city if I wasn't careful with them. I don't want to be Superman, though. He was weak against Kryptonite, after all. Plus he died. I can do better than that.

Other people must feel as I do. Why else would superheroes be so prevalent? Comic books, movies, radio, television - every medium has offered a superhero or twenty for its audience's pleasure. People like superheroes. People want to be superheroes.

Superheroes represent righteousness and valor; superheroes are an ideal. But I don't want to be a superhero to defend truth and justice. I'm in favor of truth and justice, of course, and if I could punch through walls and survive bullets to my eyeballs, no one could stop me for standing up for All Good Things. My motivations are more selfish, though. I want validation. I want my existence to be recognized, noted, and approved of. I want the common man on the street to know my name, to vehemently agree that my presence on this planet is a good thing. I want to make the world a better place to live - and be known as the man who did it. What better way to accomplish that than to save the world?

Yet there's a cruel caveat to my wishes, for I'm well aware that being a superhero must, well, suck. Much like comic superheroes themselves, my dreams have emerged from their Golden Age and into a more gritty, realistic future.
Begin the trek with Superman. Paragon of heroes, American icon, Superman personifies all that is good about heroicism. The only real problem he ever had was trying to keep people from noticing that every adventure he had was pretty much the same - something bad happens, Lois Lane somehow gets involved, Clark Kent strips in poorly-concealed public location, and Superman saves the day. Superman-style comics represent an era of heroism. The reading audience demanded heroic heroes, villainous villains, and black-and-white boundaries of good and evil.

That era ended when a radioactive spider bit Peter Park. Most superheroes are born great, or become great; Spider-Man had greatness thrust upon him. Crawling into the comic scene, he represented a new breed of hero. The world of the hero was the same - evil villains threatened the world, and Spider-Man stopped them - but the character was worlds away from stoic, noble Superman. Sure, Spider-Man had strength, speed, and a Spider-Sense - but he had to make his own costume, make a living as a photographer, even pursue romance. Spider-Man even got sick. In one comic, he sneezes, then quips to a villain, "Imagine how the inside of my mask must feel." Superman's dialogue was hardly Pulitzer-caliber writing - but Spider-Man maintained a running monologue, skewering both villains and himself with rapier wit.

"Power of lightning," intones the weather-controlling mutant, "strike again!"

"Power of webs," Spider-Man fires back, deadpan, "get real sticky!"

As time passed, superheroes evolved. With the Cold War dying down and good and evil becoming less everyday, clearcut concepts, comic writers changed their tone. The modern superheroes are mutants, homo superior, granted powers by virtue of wacky DNA. X-Men is just one example; perhaps the most popular, certainly the only one to receive movie treatment. For their powers, mutants are hated and feared by the millions of "normal" people. They are outcasts, and even when they save the world, remain hated and feared. The idea is bleak, but it resonates. It appeals to our cynical nature, in an increasingly cynical world. Would we trust Superman if another person, with similar powers, tried to control the world? Or would we fear him, fear his powers, and hate him because we fear? If my next-door neighbor controlled magnetism, would I accept him, would I admire him for his talent? Or would I blame him for every blank diskette, every erased hard drive?

I don't quite think I want to be a superhero any more. Enough people hate me as it is, for whatever reasons they so desire. I'll hunt validation elsewhere.

Inspiration returned to me, bestowed by a trilogy so brilliant I lost hours of sleep reading it. I dove back into my first chapter, awash with confidence and enthusiasm once again. More than enough time had passed. I now saw the folly of my first draft - the errors, the inconsistencies, the parts that simply screamed for elaboration or revision. The first rule of writing had served me well.

I rewrote the entire chapter. I scrapped every last word from the old draft, retooled the scenario, revised the characters, and skillfully rebuilt magnificence from ruins. In retrospect, the second draft was a Mona Lisa to the first draft's Crude Smiley Face. The second draft also had its share of flaws and errors, of course, but I was nevertheless confident that I had achieved some level of connection with my audience. It had angst, pathos, human emotion. What the hell more could anyone want?

So I attached my new work to an e-mail, and sent it out to several friends of mine who'd promised, at one point or another, to critique my work. After a little while, return e-mails trickled into my inbox. Each resembled every other; each said the same thing: "Looks good, I can't see anything wrong with it off the top of my head."

I filed the draft in a corner of my writing folder and returned to my bookcase, searching desperately for an inspiration I knew I would not feel again for some time.

I used to write stories about people. I considered it my gift, my particular talent. No other friend could write them such a skilled story. I found it easy; I even had a formula for it. Take my friend's name, general appearance, and personality quirks. Mix well and modify to taste. Pour into one large setting, a world of my own which featured prominently in my writing at the time, and simmer. Serves one.
Recipe completed, I found an excuse to give it to my friend. I thought my system was a brilliant supplement to birthdays, Christmases, and just-nice-things.

In retrospect, the stories universally and completely sucked. I think this is
why so few people from high school speak to me today.

I don't write stories for people any more; in fact, I don't do much of anything every more. Every day becomes a struggle to breathe. Every morning I drag myself out of bed, throw on my terrycloth bathrobe, and stumble four feet into the bathroom. Some mornings I can barely see through my hair, which habitually works itself into knots, tangles, and the occasional garrote while I sleep. Some mornings, usually those in which I've gotten little sleep, my general appearance would give Ctulhu pause. Even on the best of days, the image in the mirror is cruel. And oftentimes I stand in front of the mirror for a moment, absorb cruel reality, and say to myself: you poor bastard, why did you even get up?

I take solace in knowing that across the world, my fellow humans rise and ask themselves the same question every day. A never-ending wave of self-doubt follows the sun as surely as tides follow the moon. Humanity spends a great deal of time questioning its existence in the large scale - are we children of God, or perhaps mere creations? Or perhaps are we souls in a void of formlessness given the illusion of coherence by our minds? Or maybe we're just a bizarre coincidence? Could anyone resist carrying this question to a much smaller, more personal scale - why am I here? what does my existence mean?

I imagine most people have an easier answer to this than I do. If the President of the United States doesn't get up one day, there's trouble. He makes decisions that affect the lives of millions of people; presumably he's trying to improve their lives, and so every morning he can get up and say that he's trying to make life better for teeming millions. David Letterman can hop out of bed confident that today his television show will entertain a massive audience. Tom Clancy knows that the book he's working on will someday be a best-seller.

Even for the average person, the question often has an easy answer. Some people get up to write a newspaper article, or to teach a class, or even just to make the lives of their friends better with their presence. In the end, when we ask why we got up this morning, we're asking ourselves: What will I do today that will justify my continued existence?

Considering most of us haven't throw ourselves off bridges or high buildings, the question can't be so difficult to answer. From my perspective, at least, I see vast amounts of talent around me. Just off the top of my head, I could name several brilliant writers, a pair of excellent artists, a dozen people remarkably capable with computers, and three completely stellar friends and compatriots. All this just from people I've met casually, in the course of work or classes.

But I'm not so fortunate. My mental review of my options never passes muster. Am I really such a poor person, or do I simply hold myself to standards which I'll never meet? I can't answer that question.

I simply couldn't rewrite my so-called breakthrough chapter again, so I ended up writing something entirely new. This time, however, I decided that no one would see it! I would write it alone, secure in my ability to weave a superlative tale! I wouldn't let any give me the same old routine - it's fine, nothing wrong - again!

But when I wrote it, I looked at the last sentence for some time. And I thought: What if, even after I make draft after draft and spend hour after hour, day after day, making it better, it still sucks, and I can't tell? To my shame, I thought: What's the point of being a writer, and more importantly, having talent, if you don't let anyone know about it?

So I attached it to an e-mail, and sent it out to several friends of mine who'd promised, at one point or another, to critique my work. After a little while, return e-mails trickled into my inbox. Each resembled ever other; each said the same thing: "Looks good, I can't see anything wrong with it off the top of my head."

I didn't write anything for about two years after that.

I want to be distinguished somehow. I want to be notable. I want to have some talent or skill which sets me apart from all the other people a given person knows. I want my life to have meaning and purpose. I want to have a reason for existence.

Recently, I started writing again. The spark finally returned. I wrote ten pages in an hour - all of it good. I think I captured the essence of my protagonist. I think I accurately represented his conflicts and trials. I think I've done a good job capturing both the flavor and the rules of my setting; in short, I think I've written a damn good first draft. Now I'm sitting on it. It's squirreled away in my writing folder, waiting for me to take action. And I sit here. And I ask myself: now what do I do?