The Right to Write

I stood alone in the Target aisle for at least 30 minutes. I could feel my heart rate slowly ramping up and my shirt sleeves dampen with sweat. I paced frantically from one end to the other, picked up each notebook that did not have a cartoon character or the word "Journal" embossed on the front, weighed it in my hands, opened and closed it, felt the paper, eyeballed the line spacing, turned sheets, tucked it casually in my palm and pretended to carry it for a few steps. After two laps of this, I was in panic. No. None would do. I would have to go back to Barnes and Noble or Blick art store or, blow of all blows, order something online.

There are few things worse than finally making a commitment to something and then feeling your resolution dissolve out from under you.

After some tearful conversations with Les over the weekend, I decided that I really needed to get my act together and put my weeks of leisure to good use. "How can you be bored?! There are literally hundreds of books I will never have time to read, dozens of topics I will never get to study. I cannot imagine having "nothing to do". Take a class! Write! Learn how to use your fancy camera! Volunteer somewhere! Make all those things you've pinned on Pinterest!"

He wasn't scolding me - he was trying to yank me out of my funk. The funk of leaving a challenging, ever-improving job and an office full of friends. The funk of living in my in-laws' home with hours and days and weeks sprawled out in front of me, but nearly all of our possessions (i.e. - my supplies, my fancy camera, my books) packed in storage. The funk of straight up living in someone else's home, at least 30 minutes from my closest friend.

I was, in a word, paralyzed.

There are a lot of things I hope to be able to do once we move into our house, God willing, next week. But I agreed with him that that does not mean that I cannot take on at least one significant "project" right now. And so, I bought two books about the craft and practice of writing, and then found myself gripped with terror in the Target notebook aisle.

I ended up buying one "journal" style notebook and one spiral-bound notebook from my favorite notebook maker, but it was larger than the chunky mid-sized notebooks I had grown to know and love over the years. I could not find the size I wanted in the brand I wanted, so I bought the size in the journal and the brand in the notebook. By the time I got home, I realized that the journal would never do. Writing practice is too raw, too scratchy. Nothing to treasure in neatly bound volumes. The notebook would be my book. I should have purchased at least two.

So I had committed to myself to write every day for a year, and I had The Writers Book of Days as my guide. I got up the next morning, Sept. 3, aggravated with myself that I hadn't started on Sept. 1. You know, because that would have made a difference. I pondered waiting for Oct. 1, then got angry with myself and declared that Sept. 3 would mark the official start to my Nulla dies sine linea. "Never a day without a line".

No excuses now. I had the notebook, I had the guide, I even bought new pens. I managed to procrastinate until nearly 4pm yesterday because I was so nervous to begin. Afraid of failure, afraid of writing for a year and churning out nothing but crap, afraid of deciding that I am not a writer after all. Knowing deep down that that is nonsense. I have been writing since I was in kindergarten. I haven't stuck with anything as long or as compulsively or as joyfully. That's got to count for something, right? Even if I never have anything published outside of my own rambling blog, that doesn't mean I can't develop as a writer and improve my skills.

And so, from Sept. 3, 2013 until Sept. 2, 2014, I will venture to write for at least 30 minutes per day in my practice notebook. Maybe some of the scribblings will make it to the blog. Mostly, though, they are for me. Me and my brain and heart and voice.