Off the Cuff / My Other Journal

Writing Anywhere

Most any notes I took, the lists I made, the characters I created were all over the place: In a quiet café, in jam-packed Starbucks, at the beach, in a car (but not while I drove), in a plane, in a restaurant, in the bathroom, in a room full of people all talking at the same time, etc. Yet, when it comes to writing something worthwhile, I need and crave the absolute quiet. That’s why I do my best work, after midnight, after the TV is turned off and after everyone sleeps.

Having said that, I have a great respect for the writer who can write anywhere just as well and he doesn’t enforce his needs on the people around him. He must have a deep secret nobody knows. It is among my priorities to find out about that secret and impose it upon myself. Or else, I’ll either continue producing faulty work or will keep on making lists and taking notes.

Not that I don’t write at all. I write everyday actually, in notebooks longhand or in my computer, and using whatever thingamajig is handy. In truth, I fill my prescribed quota (prescribed by me as 500 words a day) and then some, but what comes out is mostly laughable. I look at it and wonder who the heck wrote this crap and where did all my studying for so many years go.

Another thing is, when the TV is on--and it is always on and hubby wants me in the same room with him—I find myself typing what the TV is saying instead of what’s in my mind. Heaven forbid I venture to write something so new and different, hoping for a work of genius or at least a work with some competence. It will probably end up being the stupidest thing conceived in any homosapien mind. Lucky that we have Word programs that can erase stuff.

I recall, in the olden times, we wrestled with white-outs and some weird strips to use with the typewriter. (Yes, I’m that old!) Although I miss the typewriter from the whatever-you-wrote-stuck times, I’m grateful for the technology of today, even if it is so boringly outrageous at times, especially when charms bar acts like a mother-in-law’s tongue, which is another thing I shouldn’t say, since I am a mother-in-law. And at this point in this entry, I’m finding myself way out of track.

Luckily, it is one of those days when I don’t lack the courage to say/write something utterly ludicrous. After all, the TV is on, and it is talking about the solar-powered plane that finished its journey. I guess, it is a hint that I should finish this entry, too, before I really go off-course, and start talking about my next-door neighbor’s new and so-called modern metal roof that is reflecting the sun into our eyes and itself becoming an eyesore in the neighborhood.

Oh well, this is what happens when I write in a crowd.