creativity

I had a professor in college who used to say that. Freshman year he thought I was a genius and junior year he was disappointed to learn that I am, in fact, just a really nervous chick.

Here’s my process: I went to writing school, and then I didn’t write another good word for two years.

I mean, that’s not entirely accurate. Of course I wrote. I wrote  half-scenes and bits of dialogue that never went anywhere, that died on the table even as I scribbled them down. I wrote birthday cards and shopping lists. I wrote my name in fifty different styles. But that was mostly it. I just…had nothing to talk about. I’ve never been one of those people who write like they’re training for a marathon, who crank out a certain number of pages or words every day regardless of whether they have anything to say. I can’t. Do it. I’ve tried. It makes me frustrated and upset and pissed off at the universe, to sit in front of the computer or in a Starbucks and stare at a blank page, white like milk, white like blindness. I write–have always written–because I love it, because when it’s going it’s better than being in love.

But when it’s not going, it’s ASS. And frankly, who needs more ass in her life? Not this girl, that’s for sure.

So I decided a long time ago that I wasn’t going to force it, that I was going to read and cook and knit scarves and make lists and wait for it–whatever IT is– to come. That’s where this blog was born, actually: a way to keep the words alive while I waited for whatever was next to reveal itself. And, finally, it did: last spring I was in the right place at the right time and I found fuel for eight, nine, ten short stories, letters and paragraphs and dialogue spilling over onto the page and the screen faster than I could get it all down. Over the summer Tom got used to coming home and finding me doing things like eating cereal and broccoli for dinner, notebooks and markers like rubble at my feet. I could feel my muscles getting longer and stronger, making connections I wouldn’t have made before. A Shred, if you will, for my brain: and one with results.

But now it’s getting colder, and as I polished up the last story I worked on a couple of weeks ago I could almost feel those very same muscles protesting, the thoughts coming more slowly, the words a bit sluggish. And couple of days later it occurred to me: I have no new writing in the pipeline.

My first reaction was panic–oh man, not this shit again. I hate this feeling, the fear and impotence, the creeping suspicion that I’m probably not a real writer after all. I banged around for awhile, slamming doors and crabbing out and staring, staring at that luminous white page. But as the leaves start to drop off the trees I’ve been starting to reconcile myself with the idea that I might have some waiting to do this season. And that’s okay. Because if I’ve learned one thing about my process this year, it’s that it will come. It will come.

Happy weekend, kiddos. I’m off to find some alternate creative outlets. See you Monday.