Finished Draft of Mannequin Monologue

Well, I said I wouldn't post more on here until it was done, and I have finished the first draft - that's good enough for me. I am not entirely happy with the ending, and I need to make it flow better, but more or less, this is it (remember this is written to be said aloud):

Mannequin Monologue

Each night, after work, I sit down at my desk, perched with my laptop, and I stare at the screen, expectant, waiting for the words to come. I feel like I have something to offer, but it just won't come out, no matter how hard I try. I got into writing purely by accident, a friend was taking a night class and didn't want to go alone, so I went with her, and found myself enthralled. I began to read a lot, and in my spare time, I would often write snippets of things, like a memoir, detailing the things that I saw each day.

Then one day, I decided to write a book, a collection of these memoirs, amusing tales about what I had seen and heard, a voyeristic picture of people who walked in front of me every day, assuming I wasn't watching. You people do the most curious things when you think no-one is looking.

But I digress. After making this decision one day, I went home eagerly and sat down, waiting for the words to start flowing. But they never did. And they still haven't. So, night after night, I sit there, looking into the oblivion of a blank Word document, and nursing a slowly-cooling mug of coffee, wishing something would appear.

I should probably introduce myself. My name is Emma. I don't have a last name, although I would like a foreign, romantic one if I did. Maybe something French. See, I have no last name, because I am a mannequin. We are not given the dignity of full names, hell, some of us they don't bother naming at all.

The funny thing about mannequins is that most people don't realise posing in shop windows is just a job. Something we were made for, sure, and something we're good at, but we have other interests and passions too. Mine is writing. I met this guy once, who modelled for the Trent Nathan suits, who was really into death metal, had this mad wig he used to mosh in and all. The point is, that we are more than simply plastic dolls that make some people envious, some uneasy, and most indifferent.

I'm not going to claim that "we are people too" or anything stupid like that, but we sure as hell have something to offer. After all, there are few people that put the effort into watching the ebb and flow of humanity like we do. Watching for hours on end, I often wish that I had the luxury of doing whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted. But unfortunately, this is my lot in life and I'm damn well going to make the most of it. And maybe leave a little something behind.

This is, of course, why I write. Or want to. Or try to. It's an odd process, see. Some authors claim that the words just appear to them and they type it out, or scribble in longhand, or whatever. Others say they imagine them. Still more claim that you type and type and eventually something good comes out and you work with that. Maybe the Muse strikes differently, somehow, for those who are made of plastic. For those like me. Or more precisely, maybe it doesn't strike at all.

Its been a few weeks now, sitting there at night. Waiting. After a few evenings of total unproductivity, I spent some time looking through news articles, or my previous scribbles, looking for something worth relating to the screen. But I had nothing to comment on - the news was pretty empty for the most part, and my memoirs, though decent, seemed distant and detached from me, as if they had been written by someone esle, a long time ago.

I've learned that writing is a fluid thing, and you have to adapt. For me, there are times when I look back and think "Oh, God, what is this garbage I've written, and how did I ever think it was any good?" Then there are times when you can look back and go "Wow, that's pretty swish."

But knowing that its fluid, knowing that some of the things I've scibbled in the past are ok, does not really help me now. I need something new, and fresh. And that is precisely where I come unstuck. When wanting to leave something behind, something tangible, life changing in the way that great books can be, it's hard to kow where to start. I have so much experience with the world that no-one sees. I wish that I could open peoples' eyes to show them what we mannequins see every day - people in pain, hurting, wishing that they could be like us, and yet wanting all that their existence has to offer as well. We have learned to be content with our lot - we can strive to change and make things better, but we were made for a purpose, and the fulfilment of that is our greatest task. Chasing a higher calling is something that you can take for granted. Not us, for us, it is a battle the whole way.

Unfortunately for me, it has been difficult to seek help. Between work and rest, I don't have a great deal of time to find people to ask for assistance, and even if I could find the time, I doubt help would be easy to come by. After all, no-one would be really interested in seeing a mannequin get published. It seems stupid, laughable - it's a waste of time even bothering with it...

A couple of weeks back, I began speaking with an older mannequin. She told me her story over a few drinks one night. On the verge of retirement, she is bitter, hates people for what they have done to her. "Years", she said, voice cracked with the whiskey she drank straight "For bloody years I have stood there and watched the bastards go by, wasting their lives wishing for something good to come out of it. They look at us, and they want our perfection, our proportions or ageless faces. People have everything we want, and they throw it away. If we could have their time, their lives, it would be different. The changes that come with age, the etching of our experiences on our faces, we would celebrate it, rejoice in it, but they stand oblivious, hating the decay of time. The world is a place of irony, my dear. And that is, without a doubt, the greatest truth of all."

She continued on with her tale of wanting to be a professional writer. She had written some amazing things, and no-one had cared. She had shown an agent once, who took her work and sold it to a down-on-her-luck author for a lot of money. Unfortunately, that's the way things go. But it makes me realise that I want to do this even more. I want to do it for her, and for me, and all my kind, and if nothing else, to show that it can be done, that we can leave something of value behind when we are through with this life, just the same as you can.


So this is why I find myself here, in this room, with you people. I want to explore the ways of expression, the techniques and crafts the same way you all do. I want to show everyone that literature is transcendant - it goes over and above everything else. I want to show that it is higher, and truer than all else, that it can change you and shape you, that it is capable of uplifting you or breaking your heart.

I have decided to start this writers' group that we all might be able to journey and explore this life and this form together, that we may grow through one another, and find inside ourselves talents and tales that we couldn't uncover on our own. Because at the end of the day, we are not made as islands, even deep within me, something more than plastic and metal throbs away, and longs to connect. Through this group, lets learn to express who and what we really are, and in sharing that, truly discover ourselves.

Copyright, Blake Jolly, 2008.