Stream of Thought

SOMEONE PLEASE SHOOT ME FOR BEING A HOPELESS ROMANTIC. I can't help myself. I hate sappy books that are over-the-top, but I feel like that is how my stories always end up. Do you agree? And did that disparaging comment give everything away about every story that I write for myself? (It seems so obvious to me when I go over my own stories that I honestly cannot tell anymore. In any case, I always hope that the beauty lies not in the end, but the journey there.)
In my mind, writing is like growing up. When I read my old work, I own it with the same contempt that I direct towards my twelve-year-old self. The greater the distance I put between myself and when the piece was written, the more I loathe it. When writing my own plot or description, there is no other tale that I would rather hear. Later though I can hardly set my eyes on that word file without experiencing the scuttling crawl of disgust up my spine. Yet I continue to love the idea of it as I love my own self. For in many ways, my writing is me more than I am. It is the spirit that looks back when I glance within, the reflection in the mirror, the hum of my parallel processors.
When I was young, I used to have a dream, a nightmare, where nothing happened. A boat glided across a surface of water, but no ripples touched the surface and it was so like a mirror, silken and smooth. A deep voice would echo across this space, words unintelligible, the intent of warning or forbidding evident in the tone. A man’s voice. I would wake crying from this dream, upset to the point of calling out to my sleeping parents. They would come to try and reassure me, ask me what the dream contained. I was without explanation though, because this fear was without name or thought. It was not fear of the lake, the boat, the voice. It was fear of the absence of ripples.
In some ways it is at the same time interesting and ironic to me that my mental image for myself is not a face, but this very lake. Deep blue and grey, it is wholly unremarkable, with an appearance not dissimilar to that of a photograph of a puddle taken in black and white, the contrast on high. This lake though is full of ripples, ripples that hardly move, but ripples nonetheless. These disturbances are a reflection of my emotion. If I am at peace, then the lake itself begins to still, grow too more pacific. When I am upset, waves crash on the invisible shore. And when I am beyond either of these emotions, in the land of depression merging on catharsis, I imagine that the lake is draining, losing some of itself. Perhaps I should not say such things, should not tell you that, but there it is.
I have been thinking for a while now that this is less a rant or a discussion, than it is a stream of thought. Think on that.