Given my blogging history the past several months, it may not look like it, but writing has almost become a compulsion for me. Back in December, I was on the phone with a close friend of mine, explaining what had been going on in my life and why I was making so many monumental changes. He listened to me share my disappointments, frustrations, hopes, and future plans and then he said, “make sure to keep all of your adventures written down. I may want to write a film script for it one day.” While I have no doubt that he’ll eventually make the big leagues in terms of theater and the performing arts (this guy can sing and dance and act like nobody’s business), a movie about my life obviously sounds way too far fetched. Nevertheless, I got some journals and started writing.
My first entry was on the plane ride over to Germany. I had had an emotional month in Texas before moving and I felt like I had poured a bit of my soul out onto the 10 pages or so I wrote. I’ve always been one of those girls that writes in a journal once and then forgets about it, so it’ll come as no surprise when I say that I didn’t write again for over a month. I did carry it with me in hopes that inspiration would strike again, but I just never felt like writing.
It must be something about plane rides, because on the flight from Israel back to Germany, I pulled out a pen and my journal and started writing again. I was listening to Ani DiFranco’s 32 Flavors and if you’ve ever listened to her, you know her lyrics can move you in ways that many artists fall short of
“I am 32 flavors and then some. And I’m beyond your peripheral vision so you might want to turn your head cause someday you’re gonna get hungry and eat most of the words you just said”
It got me thinking about how everyone has multiple facets to their personality and we don’t truly know someone just by getting to know the basics. You have to invest time and energy into getting to know someone if you want to understand them. Obviously, I’m now running off on a topic that’s better saved for another time, but as you can imagine, I wrote most of the flight back.
After that, I began writing at least once a day. It’s become one of those things where I almost feel unsettled if I don’t get my thoughts out on paper for the day. I had a friend tell me recently that if you do something every day for 30 days, it becomes a habit. The way I see it, writing isn’t too terrible of a habit to have. In fact, it’s been a wonderful way to see what has become a priority in my everyday life. I can look back at what I’ve written for the past couple of months and find the common themes and patterns, which is helpful in any sort of emotional healing process. With almost 200 pages written in the past two months, there’s a lot I’ve been able to learn about myself.
One thing I always do when I write is listen to music. Music has always been an important part of my life and my thoughts seem to flow freer when I’ve got something on in the background. If you’ve read my past couple of posts, you may have noticed some italicized words at the bottom. That’s the music I listened to as I wrote my post. My writing style tends to change with the type of music I’m listening too, and I find it fascinating to notice patterns like that. I do the same thing in my journals; music leads my thoughts in different directions and some lyrics inspire new ideas, so it’s been an interesting experience to be able to follow all of that through the music.
I suppose the reason for posting this is to say yes, I am writing. No, it might not all be made public, but I’m hoping to transfer some of my journaled thoughts to blog posts eventually. I find that I write much more openly and easier with a pen and paper than typing words out on a keyboard, but I think that some of the ideas floating around in my brain are worth sharing, so I’m going to do my best to share a few of them when I get the chance.
A lot of my writing happens looking out on this river from my patio. If that doesn’t inspire a person, I don’t know what will
listening to: john butler trio
Knocked Out No Longer 