The Desert

Watching the Mud Dry #1, a photo by []Aaroneous Monk[] on Flickr.

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Still haven't figured out this writing journal thing. I've always waited for inspiration in order to write and having some direction has always made writing easier. Writing w/o direction or inspiration, now that's a different story. When there is no excitement to fuel the writing it becomes a vast desert of unexplored territory. And what to explore? Sand? Cacti? The occasional boulder?

Writing seems to be pure magic. When I can't do it I wonder at those who can. When I am writing and it is going fairly well I wonder at where all of this information is coming from and how I am able to make sense of it all. I've also learned that I'm a sucker for alliteration and it comes up frequently when I write. So much so that I have to edit it out sometimes because it can get comical when I'm not trying to be funny. "The conniving clown cut cautiously on his crusty carbuncle." See what I mean?

At present I am trying to write a story about a crow I killed when I was a kid. I sense there is something powerful and disturbing in this story. I feel a need to write it out, to think it through, and come out on the other end with some new insight into myself. I love the idea of writing as self-therapy. I was made aware of this facet of writing when I was taking pictures and writing poems during a deployment to Iraq. It was so desolate there with no escape to familiar places or a recourse to well known faces. Sitting in my little concrete room at night I could handle the fear, the tedium, and the loneliness by writing a poem and pairing it with a picture.

Another recent example was starting with the idea of "I remember when" which led to memories of visits to a laundromat in the small town I grew up in. When we first moved there I was starting first grade and we were renting a house while waiting for our house to be built on the edge of town. The rental house, I later learned from my Mom, had no washer and dryer and that is why we were visiting the laundromat that first year or so. In writing down that little walk down memory lane I was able to gain a greater appreciation for my Mom. Our relationship was pretty bumpy growing up and looking at this one little bit of our lives by writing about it as an adult brought some understanding and healing with it.

So writing *is* powerful, but you gotta put down the words and spelunk the brain. That's what this journal is all about and this is my second entry, Hurray!
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