On the block

The thing about writing, for me, is that I can’t imagine just letting it loose -- typity typity typity type, dancing or marching its own way along. I seem to need some kind of a chart, a map maybe, before I can even begin the Thing. Without the map, I have no faith in the process (I’m so TIRED of that word); I hold deep envy for those who can keep journals, jotting down in the language of chit-chat, this and that, not caring a whit whether it’s interesting or not, just strolling over their day again, setting it to rest. “Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.” I wonder if they sleep better than I do, having given themselves a chance to parse the events and activities that took place before their rest, like putting clean dishes away: glasses in one cupboard, by size; silverware in a drawer, by configuration; that kind of thing. I think I’m too impatient to care what HAS happened -- I want to go on and see what’s next, or, if I’m tired, just to sleep; unfortunately without a working journal, I have to leave it to my unconscious to deal with the Stuff of the day, and sometimes it scares itself into complete wakefulness.

So anyway, about writing a Thing: with such dependency on a Map, I have first to decide what point I want specified; if it were a Google map, I’d want an address first, and then I’d pick the manner of the journey. What in the hell do we do, or DID we do, when it was time to set out across the plains, just to head vaguely west? Or cross the ocean, any ocean? Just step out there? Make our own maps while we were at it? Clearly so. There must have been a time when I wasn’t this unnerved by the lack of a precise destination; my curiosity knows no bounds in the realm of information, so I can’t imagine what stops me short of easy, fluid writing -- there’s a prong collar around my fifth chakra, that’s what it is.

Grreta is one of those dogs that go absolutely nuts in thunder; her terror is so great that she loses all sanity -- it’s blind, deaf, senseless horror. One of her spells can be mitigated or delayed by dressing her in a very snug doggie cape (not feasible in the desert in the summer), or, we’ve just discovered, by putting on her training collar -- complete with prongs. The thing about a prong collar is that it fits very closely around the neck, rather like a choker necklace on a person, and is not particularly bothersome until some pressure is put on the leash, and that pressure (according to Cesar Milan) feels like a more like the disciplinary but not necessarily aggressive grasp of an alpha dog, or the dog’s mother teaching a graphic lesson. That is reassurance to a dog, to Grreta, and she feels she can stand down from her usual posture of shepherd, caretaker, because somebody else can take charge for a while. (If she’s hysterical, she can’t very well take care of the rest of us, and that helplessness makes her feel even MORE upset, and so it goes.) The only other way she can feel off duty is to be in her crate, where she can shudder and shake unobserved.

I love my crate, my bedroom and the bed in it; for an apparent extrovert, I surely do crave my solitude. That ought be a good thing for one born to be a writer; there are few more solitary pursuits. To avoid the guilt of not writing, the crippling block, other than taking to my bed (such a Victorian concept), I suppose I can only put the demons to rest by applying my own prong collar, or holing up where I don’t have to talk to anybody, and certainly avoiding my computer, whose blank screen admonishes and seduces simultaneously. Problem is, not only is that lonesome, since I’m deprived even of my own company, but also without some kind of human contact, the stimulation of companionship, my system slows and slows until there’s barely any juice flowing of any kind. What can follow THAT is pretty horrible in itself: a migraine, or a first-class depression.

WHOA! We won’t go there this time, although I’m sure we’ll have to sooner or later.