Friends, we are Writers — We Write
I wrote this to inspire myself, maybe it will help you… or not.
Tom strives hard at his work. Words form lines and he reads them hungrily before a swishing pencil tore them and took them out and the air was filled with whispered profanities. By nightfall he had four thousand words down; hard bitten words that came not from inspiration but from hard work and the belief that he is a writer and just the word alone implies professionalism.
Being a writer does not afford you the luxury of sitting around waiting for inspiration. You write.
Waiting for inspiration is like waiting for a train to arrive, and still you wait, suitcases are packed, bells ring in far off steeples. Hell, some journeys are begun and finished and you’re still waiting. You write. You are a writer.
While you are procrastinating, the ideas are right there, pick one. Look out the window, autumn leaves are disappearing, a dog barks over the hill, emails are being written, sent, regretted, or talk of love or fear or fun — but you don’t know that because you’re still waiting for that idea — that spark of inspiration.
When will you know?
Ideas will come into your head, glow, burn, fail and that idea, like a train, blows its whistle and moves off. Your throat will constrict, loss is painful in that moment. Some will know a subtle, spiritual moment, something happening in the night that you must get up for, but it's just a flicker, and blows out on the stairs.
Don’t concern yourselves. Whatever it is, it takes time to arrive. Trust me, I understand how difficult it can be; to be always thinking about something remarkable, or ordinary, but you can do it because you’ve always done it, because you’re a writer. You write.
You and me, we don’t always know what is going on in our heads. Ideas are like crossed wires, or lightning strikes, others come slowly from far away, taking time to become clear, like it was passing Saturn on its way to Jupiter, flying through space and passing cosmic galaxies too far off to think about, on its way you. There is no sure-fire way to know when they will arrive.
Inspiration is special, but waiting for it signals you’re not a writer at all. You’re simply waiting while the thing you’re hoping will come is shining through millions of years of light, sliding passed electric fields, captured by a writer a hundred, two hundred, a thousand years from now.
What if it came and you never saw the magic? Too busy making fools of yourselves. I’ve done it, that is me. I was too busy making a fool of myself. Dreaming up fantastic worlds when the most fantastic world is right here all the time. I don’t need something coming from light years away to tell me about acrobats, or beggars, artists, and bandits, philosophers and then there’s the whole Orient thing, traveling to hail a new life.
Because you’re a writer. You write.
I’ve felt the same desperation, felt the ball of wool in my throat, stuck there. But when I put my hand in my pocket, I found a coin. Wait, a coin, a beggar, stinking clothes, and the idea comes down to one living in a primitive state, writing.
Because that is what a writer does.
More from Harry:
Adrienne Beaumont, Alan (AJ) Autistic Widower, Brett Jenae Tomlin, The Sturg, Vidya Sury, Collecting Smiles, Trisha Faye, Karen Schwartz, Nancy Oglesby, Katie Michaelson, Bernie Pullen, Michelle Jimerson Morris, Amy, Julia A. Keirns, Pamela Oglesby, Tina, Pat Romito LaPointe, Ruby Noir 😈, Brandon Ellrich, Misty Rae, Karen Hoffman, Deb Palmer, Susie Winfield, Vincent Pisano, Marlene Samuels, Ray Day, Randy Pulley, Michael Rhodes, Lu Skerdoo, Pluto Wolnosci 🟣, Paula Shablo, Bruce Coulter, Ellen Baker, Kelley Murphy, Leigh-Anne Dennison, Jennifer Marla Pike, Carmen Ballesteros, Patricia Timmermans, Keeley Schroder, Jan Sebastian 🖐👩🦰, James Michael Wilkinson, Whye Waite, John Hansen, Trudy Van Buskirk
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Thanks for reading.
