Why Do I Write?

Lately I've been reading other blogs, especially those about one of my favourite subjects, writing.  My reading has started me thinking, and isn't that the reason we read, to think about new things or think about some things differently? What I'm thinking about is "why do I write?"

Why, when I come home from a long day of work, do I not just sit back with a cup of tea and watch a movie or read a novel?  Why do I come to the computer and make myself write, even when I'm "not in the mood" to write?  The fact that I make myself write when I'm not so inclined suggests to me that writing is more than just a hobby, more than something I do in my spare time, or when I feel like it.

If that were the case, I'd write very little.  No, it's something much more than any of those that keeps me writing.  I think I'm driven to write; writing is as important to me as breathing.  Without it, I'd be someone other than who I am.  I write because I can't not write.  I tried that for many years and the results were frustration and intense restlessness.

Ever since I was ten years old, sitting up late at night writing incredibly trite and cliched horse stories - complete with "proudly arched necks" and "tossing manes" - I've been writing.  When I gave it up for a time out of discouragement and some episodes of depression, I wasn't my self.  Instead I tried to smother the urge to write by reading everything I could get my hands on.  It helped but only a little.

Too often, as I was reading, I found myself thinking that I could do as well, sometimes even better.  I don't think it was pride; I merely knew that I could write.  I fully expected to need lots of revision and to encounter roadblocks in the execution of my stories and, now that I'm writing again that's exactly what's happening.  But ... I'm writing again ... and loving it, feeling like I'm somehow more complete, more real.  Perhaps because I'm doing what I was created to do and given some of the talents needed.

We're not whole if we're not living up to our potential, not expressing our real being in our daily lives, whatever we do.  So, I guess I write because I have to, because I don't like the feeling of unease that builds inside me when I've been away from it for a time.  And in the end,  writing is something that I can leave behind for others and hope that some part of it might inspire another writer to come back after a time of not writing to write what  springs out of his or her heart.

Writer's Block

It's considered the dreaded bane of every writer: that blankness in the brain when every idea has fled but the urge to create remains.  Why, when I sit down at my computer or pick up my pen, does every fascinating thought disappear but when I'm far from my computer or find myself without a pen or notebook (rare in my case but has been known to happen to me) the ideas skip and dance in my head, almost tripping over each other in their game of catch-me-if- you-can, as though daring me to try to remember them when I need them later?

Actually, if the truth be told, I don't believe there is such a thing as writer's block.  Yes, there certainly are many of those frustrating moments when I can't seem to generate the right flow of words about the topic I'm supposed to be engaged with, but I can always write something.  It may not be on topic; it's certainly not likely to be brilliant; but it will be words on the page.

And words on the page are quite simply magic.  Perhaps not the words I meant to write and perhaps not the words I need to write but nevertheless magic words on the page or screen.  I've been known to start work on a descriptive paragraph and find myself stalled,  not  able to get started.  So what do I do?  I simply write something, anything, anyway.  On topic or not, it gets me started and a start usually brings progress.

 Even on holiday, I try to keep the words flowing.

Once I was trying to begin a new chapter of the novel I'm working on and had no idea of how I was going to express the vague ideas floating about in my head but I had a very good idea of how the chapter was going to end.  So, I began to write...

So, these two people, I guess they're friends of that doctor in chapter 3, somehow they get to talking and when they're done they realize they met before twenty years ago.  Janet's shock at his revelation twisted her face to something almost inhuman and George realized she remembered everything.  Slowly his hand crept towards the light switch behind him as he awaited the moment to make his move.  Thought she'd fooled him, did she?  He'd show her; he'd show all of them; no one would ever laugh at him again.

Obviously the first sentence is going to get revised, probably right off the page, and while I was writing the last few words I had already found some of the words to describe the events that brought George and Janet to the same place at the same time.  Now my problem was how to get everything down on the page fast enough.

And, if I'd had to I would have started off by writing a description of my dog, my car, the trees outside my living room window, anything that would get the word gears turning in my head.  Words beget words which beget more words.  With the magic of the delete key, I don't have to keep them all, only the ones I want, the ones that suit the purpose.  What really matters is that I conquered the "writer's block" and created a sequence of words, which is all that writing really is, words arranged to convey a particular meaning.