Inspiration

Something I have to learn is that inspiration doesn't always come when I want it to. I grow frustrated with myself when I want to establish a good work ethic by waking up in the morning and working on a story or poem. Some days it's just not happening no matter how long I stare at the computer. I have to learn to be patient, and trust myself, and have faith that I'll get a good idea the next day, or the day after that, or eventually.

Yesterday I started working on my story for the "frozen time" assignment and wasn't happy with the first two pages I'd written. I was getting all hung up on the details and logistics of what I was writing. I felt like Del in "Lives of Girls and Women" when she's constructs her daydreams of seducing or being seduced by Mr. Chamberlain.

She says: "beyond the moment of revelation my dream did not go. In fact it often did not get that far, but lingered among the preliminary details, solidifying them. The moment of being seen naked cold not be solidified, it was a stab of light. I never pictured Mr. Chamberlain's reaction, I never very clearly pictured him. His presence was essential but blurred; in the corner of my daydream he was featureless but powerful, humming away electrically like a blue fluorescent light" (145).

The story I want to write remains a blurry fluorescent light. I'm lingering on the preliminary details. And I've noticed I do this a lot. Recently, I took another look at a twenty-page story I wrote last summer. I realized that fifteen pages should be thrown away. What I really wanted to say was at the end. But I don't think it was a waste of time to throw away the bulk of the story. I needed to get through those first fifteen pages to figure out what the story was really about.

So yesterday I left the two pages I had written and took out two books from the library instead. Reading never feels like a waste. I decided I'm starting over with the "frozen time" assignment, but I now have a better idea of what I want the story to be about. And today, my inspiration returned, and I worked on two new riddles.