OK. I'm just going to come right out say it. I'm having trouble writing the blogs.
It's not writer's block.
It's not apathy.
It's not a matter of having the time to do it.
And it's certainly not a matter of having enough material.
I can't tell you how many times I've found myself driving in the car and saying to myself (out loud.....I talk to myself a lot when I'm driving), "That thing that Dad did this morning.....I should write about that!" Or, "That conversation Mom and Dad had yesterday....I should write about that!"
Then I get home. And it never happens. It's not that I forget what I was going to write about. It's more about the motivation. I WANT to write. I just don't do it. I start to sort of dread the energy it takes to sit down and actually hammer out something on the keyboard. It reminds me of that lazy lumpy feeling I sometimes get before I workout. Like whining little kid who moans and groans because they have to take the trash out....I really don't want to do it, but I know I need to.
And the thing is......I always feel so much better after I've written a new post (again.....much like the workout). There's a certain exhilaration to it. I think, "Great! Another little chunk of this adventure recorded for posterity!" I even recognize, on some level, the multiple reasons I have for writing (again....like the workout). But for the last three weeks.........I have voluntarily avoided, purposely self-distracted, consciously re-directed myself from doing exactly that--from doing, in fact, what I am doing right now.
So.....woohoo. Yay me!..... I guess. But now that I'm here, rather than churn out all of those "great" ideas by writing one blog after the other, I think I'll present a nutshell version of each one. You'll get the idea, right?
There was the idea I had to write a piece called "Skin" that would somehow connect my recent observations of Dad's 94 year old skin (that I decided looks like a wadded up, flesh-colored sheet of ancient plastic wrap that was discovered in a tomb somewhere, unearthed, spread out, and then wrapped around my father's body) with the near-virgin skin of my 4 1/2 month old granddaughter (that feels like finely polished glass, if glass were soft and billowy, and smelled like.......well, like babies).
There was the one I was going to call "To Mow..." which would have described how Dad suddenly decided one day that he felt good enough to mow again (He had announced to me about two months ago that he was officially handing over the task of mowing to me, since he was feeling too much pain in his back and hips.), and how I watched him from my office, carving tracks out of the grass, back and forth, around and around, and then suddenly stopping in the middle of the 1/2 acre and just sitting there motionless, which caused me to jump up (fearing he was feeling dizzy or faint or worse, having a heart attack) and go out to see what was wrong, and walking up to Dad-On-Stopped-Tractor and asking, "Everything ok?" he replying with only, "Oh yeah! I'm just sitting here enjoying the beautiful day."
And finally, there's the one I was going to write called "CockaNuts" about Dad's recent craving for donuts which coincidentally started when my brother and I discovered a new local donut shop, CockaDoodleDonuts, and brought home a sampling. Let me be clear. Nobody, I repeat, NObody, knows the nutritionally vapid nature of donuts more than I. But Dad's philosophy is, "I'm 94. I've lived a great life. Now I'm going to do whatever I want." So now, he's decided he wants donuts. A lot of donuts. Fritters. Apple fritters. Regularly. It's crazy. I set out a plate of fresh donuts in the morning. And by the next morning, there is only one gnawed off half of a donut left.
Get the title now?
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