TAKING A WALKAROUND THE WRITER'S BLOCKby Wendel James Potter
January 19, 2008
I've been promising visitors to this site a new column for some time now. This wasn't supposed to be it.
I've not been on a column deadline for three years now, since the newspaper I worked for let the axe fall on me like a rusty guillotine blade. So now, without a deadline and since I don't get paid to create these literary works of art, my fingers don't always do the walking when I sit down at the keyboard.
Sometimes the fingers get wrapped around a beer can or a sandwich. Oftentimes, they wrap themselves around the cover of a good book.
It's called Writer's Block. It's the deadliest disease known to writers.
It's kind of like arthritis of the mind. The thoughts are there, but it aches when you try to get them out in a sensical (as opposed to nonsensical) word form.
Hugh Prather, billed at www.beliefnet.com as a minister/lecturer/author, is popular for his pithy quote, "If the desire to write is not accompanied by actual writing, then the desire must be not to write."
How cute. It might be noted that his bio on beliefnet states that all of his books were co-written with his wife, Gayle.
Apparently his desire to write has always been accompanied by Mrs. Prather's writing. So when writer's block kicks in for ol' Hugh, ol' Gayle steps up to the plate.
Where does he get off telling the rest of us writers what our desires are and are not? Reverend Prather should be billed as a minister/CO-writer/smug son of a bitch.
Now sometimes, when my desire to write is not accompanied by writing, I go for a long walk. I have a route that I follow that leads me to the front doors of a beautiful Presbyterian church. There's something about standing in the shadow of that church that puts me at rest, fills me with contentment.
Sometimes I walk around to the back of the church where a large wooden Celtic cross stands on a concrete pedestal. I've featured a photo of that cross in an earlier column. Here it is again:
That cross inspires me. Being Irish, I'm drawn to the Celtic design. Being Catholic, I wonder if the Presbyterians aren't trying to steal my soul.
But out of these walks often come good ideas which can lead to profoundly written essays. Unfortunately, the weather in Nebraska has been abysmally cold.
So my walks around the Writer's Block have been suspended. Thus, I haven't been very profound.
Not that I haven't been writing at all. For the past couple of months I've been producing and editing material for a performer in California.
Her name is Karen Knotts and she's the daughter of the late comic actor Don Knotts. Karen's one-woman show is a nostalgic tribute to her father.
I've had ideas for columns that just haven't panned out. Originally, I was going to write about Disney World. Victoria & Albert's, a "AAA five-diamond rated" restaurant at Walt Disney World in Florida has recently announced that it no longer allows children under 10 years of age in its establishment. This seems callous and snooty and un-Waltlike.
But the more I thought about it, there just wasn't enough substance in the story to generate an entire column. My first thought was, What in the Wonderful
World of Disney are they thinking, running a restaurant at Walt Disney World that keeps out the small fry?
Then, I remember our family's trip to Disneyland in Anaheim in 1986. Our oldest son, who was four at the time, watched the Disney Channel religiously and knew all about the "bumper cars" at Disneyland. That was his main focus when we entered the gates.
Come to find out that some attractions at Disneyland are restricted to larger fry, the bumper cars being one of them. A cutout of Donald Duck with his hand extended proclaimed that you could not ride the bumper cars unless "you are this tall".
Our Adam was too little. He was crushed. So were a couple of midgets in line directly behind us. (At first, I thought they were two of the Seven Dwarfs.)
So this must be how it goes down at the ultra-chic Victoria & Albert's restaurant: certainly you are greeted by a cutout of Mickey Mouse dressed as a maitre d' with his three-fingered hand extended. "You cannot eat here unless you are this tall". ("Or you're a midget who tips big".)
Walt Disney would have had a fit. But, hey. It's 2008, the age of the Greedhead. What do you expect from a bunch of corporate snot-nosed simpletons who don't even have a clue what Walt was about and who are fittingly represented by Goofy?
Oh, well.
I could write about Hillary Clinton turning on the emotional waterworks in New Hampshire and surprisingly snatching victory from those hungry slavering jaws of projected winner Barack Obama.
She's just too good, been around too long to linger behind. She's like a bloodhound hot on the scent of the Democratic nomination.
But that's a story for the political pundits and the broadcast media's talking heads. What I would have to say on that subject would be nothing but a trite blog. And a good deal of blogging is produced by those whose desire to write is accompanied by extremely bad writing, leading me to believe that writing takes more than desire.
Well, I just checked my word count. Guess what? I'm nearing 900 words. It's time to stop.
Maybe taking a walk like this with you, around the perimeter of the Writer's Block inside my head was a good idea. I've just written a column. And that was my desire.
Copyright 2008
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