Empty

Sometimes, I am overflowing with the desire to write.  My mind feels alive, and my stomach dances with excited anticipation.  There is something so liberating about opening up my laptop with just the quiet of the night ahead of me.  And yet, this vast expanse of opportunity suddenly sucks me in, and I sit, waiting apprehensively with my fingers positioned on my keyboard, lightly rubbing the bumps on the f and j key as if they will somehow stimulate my fingers to type.

Even now, as I sit to write this blog, the word evades me of what I am experiencing.  Emptiness?  No.  Road block?  Ah...writer's block.  I've got it big time, but I'm already sitting here, desperately wanting a piece that will inspire, or take me away on an intense journey.

I've come to know my style of writing, and it's really not that impressive.  I read the works of others, and I am simply blown away.  How did they choose that gorgeous word?  How is it that their sentences are so flowing, so meaningful, and so witty?  It's almost as if I'm comparing my mirror image to theirs.  I know that everyone speaks differently, thinks differently, and writes differently.  But shouldn't my own writing leave me breathless?

It doesn't matter how many creative writing classes I take, I'll never get to where I want to be unless I read.  And that's my problem.  I immerse myself in the lazy realm of television, demanding to be entertained and enriched when in reality, I'm rotting.  I want to write, but I'm too lazy to read.  I don't want to sit and read what others have created; I want to become the creator.  I want to find in my books that cold, dark, dusty castle that I can wander around in.  I want to meet the ghosts that others have met, I want to laugh the way others have laughed.  But for right now, all I can write about is the life I know, the thoughts I think, and the experiences that I wake to live.

There's a million things that I should be doing right now, like dishes, laundry, or picking up the toys that I'm pretty sure a tornado dragged across  my house.  I should change my sheets, hang the towels, and pick up that dumb plastic bag that I threw outside with the kitty litter and poop inside.  But I don't want to.  I'm sitting here, typing, praying that an idea will spark, and that I'll go to bed feeling satisfied with myself, as if I finally managed to do something productive today.


Writer's block is a painful symptom to have, especially on nights like this when the desire to create is overwhelming, but I'm helplessly staring at the blank white page.  Am I trying too hard?  Is there really nothing worth writing about?  I guess it's like going on a walk with no purpose.  You don't get anywhere until you start moving.  Maybe that's my problem.  Maybe just typing, getting my fingers moving, getting my brain thinking is the beginning I need to fill up my empty page.