My ex-fiancee, B, once wrote on her blog:
when i don’t write every day, words devolve into lists, a sense of freedom lapses into the default of routine — and it gets more and more difficult to practice poetry again. we all know there is some peace to living with head full of white noise.
it’s not writer’s block. it’s a very delicate scale that weighs experience + sensation against expression. and when one side is too heavy the other side has to battle for balance.
I’ve noticed the same experience – when I struggle to write, I create lists, I write about what I was going to write about…. When I first met her, B’s dating profile said “I am a writer….. Off-time I work on my own creative projects.” I would have liked to have seen some of those projects, to have inspired some of those projects, to have helped give space to some of those projects…
Today got away from me a bit. I was tired when I woke up, and I struggled to write. I started a post called dating advice – I had wanted to write about the things I’ve learned from a few of the books I’ve read. My friend from Omaha and I have been talking about what we value in a relationship which has put me in the mind frame of trying to answer that question. My friend Stacy and I had a long conversation tonight about home and how it’s a state of being more than anything else – I’d like to write about that…. and so “words devolve in to lists…” And sometimes a post is little more than apology for not honoring my commitment to myself to make space to think and write.