Snippet

I wonder if writers tend to live much of their lives, much of their days, in their minds. In their heads. I've always had this sort of sponglike memory. A brain that remembers things quite easily. Memorizing lines to a song or poems or speeches or a story I overheard in the park. I remember. (Which is why I was the friar in the the Christmas play at church in 1989. He had the most parts, and I had no problem just memorizing the heck out of those speaking parts. Yes, I was a boy.)

I recall people in action, one-liners, words that friends say that struck a chord deep with in me- I remember. And not for the sake of hanging onto a grudge or fiery conversation- and not to sulk in what was said in rage, but I just remember. The good and the bad.

I think my head is constantly open to receive and always looking for some great thing: an experience, a sound, a conversation, a phone call that will change something- physically or within me- and be worth writing about. Worth telling again. I think in stories. In sentences. In ways that I can fit what is going on even now into an article or piece of creative non-fiction or a short story.

And all this awareness isn't so bad most of the time, however I'm beginning to feel like I'm living on the surface. I'm living on the Earth and not in it (to steal an idea from Don Miller.) Last night in Yoga our instructor encouraged us to stop doing- for just a moment- stop think about doing- and just be. Yes, be in the moment, but what about being in my skin. Being in my life- living outside my braininess. It shouldn't be this hard. I'm trying so hard to stop trying so hard.

I'm trying to be more spontaneous and less ridged in my life- do things as they come, make plans as they are presented. Trying being the operative term here, because even last weekend- Friday, Saturday & Sunday- I drew out a huge graph/ chart on yellow legal paper, which is still laying on my coffee table, and plotted out my days. Brunch here, seafood with sister there, yoga and running and church and massage and shopping at Target... it was all fitted into the hours and time just so. Voila! I've created my perfect weekend. But have I really? What about just living?

Even now, as my Vitamin B complex and calcium sit heavily on my stomach- sloshing around in far too little food- plain yogurt and 1 cup of some health food store cereal with Amaranth and Flax in it, I wonder why I (we) stop ourselves short of being part of our own stories. And it too makes me feel a little ill. I'm continuously looking for snippets of life- real people in the midst of real life issues-when it's happening all around me and within me as well.