the wonders never cease....
I have writers block. Or rather, writer's insecurity. I've never been great at self expression, and today I seem to be fumbling more than usual. I keep trying to tell a story, then deleting it half way through.
Is it sincerity I struggle to find? I'm in New Zealand and people keep asking me what I think of the place and I feel like I'm supposed to exude wonder at its remarkable unearthly beauty. And though I do want to write tales of this natural wonderland, the stories don't seem to come. Maybe that's why all my words feel so forced to me.
This isn't to say I am without awe. Camping in the Northland was full of magic, such as the giant Kauri trees in the Whaipoua forest, and the massive sand dunes on Ninety Mile beach (if only I had my boogie board). But outside of the forest, far from sand and sea, words escape me.
The other day, Tim and I were on a walk in the Waitakere Ranges, a chain of hills 25 km west of central Auckland. While walking through a dense bit of forest, it struck me that the landscape seemed almost too perfect. The scenery reminded me of Brookfield Zoo's "Tropic World", a house designed to look like the prototypical rainforest, ideal but contrived. And yet, NZ isn't contrived at all, it's filled with natural beauty in a near idyllic state, and I'm so dumbfounded by it all that the best I can do is compare it to a zoo!
