It is New Year's Day. January 1, 2026.
I took my parents to the Incheon seaside. There is a seafood kalguksu restaurant there where whole seafood goes in.
It was around 11 in the morning, a bit early to call it lunchtime, but the breakfast crowd had already swept through the restaurant once. Fortunately, we were shown to seats without waiting long.
Seafood kalguksu heaped as generously as ever. The price still 14,000 won per person. The thought arose of the price of a bowl of gomtang in Gwanghwamun. The distance is far, but this place is still a great value spot, I thought.
I opened by pouring a little sesame oil and vinegar-chili paste on the barley rice first. A tangy sensation spread around my lips and my appetite awoke. Soon after, crispy seafood pajeon came out, and finally the seafood kalguksu arrived on the table.
As it was a gathering with my parents, I had ordered 3 portions of seafood kalguksu plus pajeon, but the owner quietly corrected it to 2 portions of kalguksu with pajeon.
"This way is just right."
I had the sense this was a place where satisfying the customer and sending them home happy without leftovers came before profit. It was a moment that made my heart warm once more.
After finishing the meal and slowly driving home, the Incheon sea stretched out long. The sea on New Year's Day was quiet, like a person who chooses words carefully.
The scene of that day lingered strangely for a long time. Like a meal that was neither too much nor too little.
And the next morning,
I was sitting at my desk again. Today I intentionally had no outdoor activities. I wanted to have my own time of contemplation in the empty house, with my wife and son briefly away. With my son absent, the living room that was always bustling was quiet, and the house that was busy felt considerably calmer. I went to the study, leaned back on the bean bag, and put on a movie. Partly because I didn't quite know what to do.
The pressure to write was certainly there, but I was at a loss for what story to write. I wanted to write but at that moment didn't want to write. The urge to write hadn't yet welled up from within.
New Year's second day passed like that.
New Year's third day arrived.
Had the pressure to write followed me even into my dreams? In the dream I was murmuring "nevertheless, writing must continue" and woke up.
Looking at the clock it was around 8:30 in the morning.
I had expected my heart to feel warm with the new year, but perhaps because of the empty house, the air felt unusually cold. It may have been partly because the heating hadn't fully risen, but it may also have been the emptiness remaining in my heart. After brushing my teeth I went back to the study and sat blankly for a while, then around 10 started cleaning. While running the vacuum cleaner I thought the head was really not satisfactory, connected to Naver, and a special sale popup happened to appear so I impulsively ordered one.
After letting time flow like that again, I sat back in the study chair.
I felt I should now put in writing the sentence "nevertheless, writing must continue" that had been following me since the dream.
Sitting in the quiet study, I repeated that sentence in my heart several times.
Nevertheless, writing must continue.
I slowly began thinking about why this keeps holding me, what brought me before this sentence.
Reflecting carefully, there were scenes I had frequently encountered up to now.
"What should I write today."
It sounded like a question to someone, but in fact it is a question I throw at myself. The time spent pausing before this question has strangely grown longer as the time for publishing writing books, giving lectures, and explaining writing in words has increased.
Ironically, the time for writing has gradually been pushed back as the occasions for talking about "writing" have increased.
"Are you still writing these days?"
Someone asks after a lecture ends. I smile and nod.
"Yes, of course."
But that answer is always followed by a brief silence.
Am I really still writing?
Not stopped, but perhaps putting it off?
Writing is often misunderstood as a matter of talent, but what I have confirmed living is that most writing is the product of training.
Sentences resemble muscles. Without writing, they quickly go dull. When I've been away for a while and start tapping the keyboard again, I feel before my fingers that my heart has stiffened. The sense of choosing words blurs, and the rhythm of sentences is lost.
I have witnessed several times the scene of people in any field, once recognition has accumulated, moving to lectures, management, and advisory positions rather than the hands-on work they had grown accustomed to. I can't say that change is entirely bad. It is also a natural flow, and a process of expanding roles.
However, in that process I have also frequently witnessed moments when the sensation that started them in that work in the first place, the tension obtainable only in the field, gradually recedes. At the end of that thought I naturally came to look back on my current self.
A sentence that felt heavily stuck inside me like something indigestible came to mind. And one more sentence was added to my heart.
Nevertheless, writing must continue.
For those who write, at some point it is easy to become not "someone who writes" but "someone who talks about writing."
I had no choice but to pause. Could it be that I too am standing somewhere on that boundary?
Reflecting carefully,
between "someone who writes" and "someone who talks about writing," a natural gap forms over time. That difference comes not so much from an attitude as from whether one is still standing before sentences, or looking back on experiences of a past time.
A "someone who writes" still hesitates before sentences. They write and erase, revise again, trying endlessly to confirm which sentences still feel alive in this era, which expressions are already becoming outdated.
In contrast, "someone who talks about writing" tends to linger a little longer in the sensibility of some point they had clearly reached. That sensibility cannot be said to be wrong, but it may not always move together with the speed at which the world moves in the same rhythm.
As I came to think of this difference, thoughts naturally continued.
There are clearly trends in writing too.
It wouldn't be unreasonable to call it a trend. Of course, I have no desire to forcibly fit myself into the latest trends. But I want to not look away from the fact that change is happening. I think that the moment one looks away from the very fact that change is happening, writing may gradually lose its connection to the present.
If I want to protect the value of my writing, the emotion writing gives, the weight sentences possess even within that change — ultimately I will need to gradually attune my own sensibility and writing style to the times.
Like an old piano undergoing constant subtle tuning to not lose its original timbre. Not replacing it with a completely new instrument, but tightening strings that have slightly stretched, correcting notes that have slightly gone off. Only by doing so can familiar melodies resound again in the current air.
The fact that I published a book once reassured me.
'This is enough' quietly settled into one corner of my heart. But the era doesn't permit such reassurance. Because if I stop now, it may be only up to here.
The way of writing, the quality of sentences that are read, the rhythm of readers — nothing stays still. A sentence that was valid today may become an outdated expression tomorrow.
Gradually attuning my own sensibility and writing style within change. That is probably the best I can do right now.
"Well, I must write."
I murmured in a small voice. The reason I uttered the words even though no one was listening was because I wanted that phrase to remain in the room like a promise to myself.
Continuing to write may perhaps be a more modest resolution than vowing to write well.
The choice not to stop the hand even when today's sentence is clumsier than yesterday's, for tomorrow's sake.
The attitude of gradually renewing oneself within change, no matter how the world changes.
I place my hands back on the keyboard. Not to think of a perfect sentence, but to write down the emotion of this very moment first.
Writing must continue like that.
Not because I published a book, and not to speak well. Because the moment I stop writing, I feel writing will become distant from me myself.
Today, I, right now
grasping one sentence that had been weighing on me since the dream
I am writing.
Nevertheless, writing must continue.
Using this sentence as a theme, in a way a little different from usual, I continue to write, revise, and slowly refine.
Sometimes I think this kind of writing is fine too. Pouring out all the many thoughts that come to mind at once, and then quietly untangling the tangled thoughts inside — writing letters and words onto paper like unwinding threads. The process of writing itself becomes time to organize thoughts, and those organized thoughts gradually gather into one piece of writing.
In fact, anyone who agonizes over writing always stands before similar questions.
"What should I write today."
Having been writing for 17 years now, I am no different. Today the theme was clearly set, but finding material fitting that theme and calling up my experiences was still not easy. In such moments, I want to cautiously recommend the method I'm employing now.
Constantly repeating the theme in my head, and then — even clumsily — first writing down in letters the memories and emotions that touch that sentence. Then reading again, revising, slightly trimming, and completing one essay through the process of editing. Not starting to write after thinking of the perfect sentence, but a method of creating sentences and thoughts together while writing.
Perhaps writing must always continue like that. Not because there is certainty, but to not stop the process of writing until reaching certainty. So today too I once again grasp that sentence and carefully, but to the end, write it through.
Today too I start writing again for that one reason.
