Writing is a desperate
inevitability. I write or I die. Inside, in that hidden part of me nestles the
seed of who I am, who I was and who I can be. When my system refuses to form
healing words, I feel the rot from that seed creep out to my organs, to my
bones, seeping sepsis in my blood stream to release in sweat and tears and,
inexorably, depression.
I write to touch the beauty
around me. Colors named, textures contoured, my self settles into my chair,
breathing this air, on this afternoon. This box of a room suddenly holds
precious my niece’s laughter, notes we sing together, whispered stories with my
sister, talk of tattoos-aliens-superheroes with my brothers, and my mother’s
low-toned urgent confidences. Through words I can push my face into my fleece
blanket and rub, writhe, revel, remember and, sometimes, even forget.
I write to access that part of
me where magic and humor reside. Words wave over the gregarious grown-up to
reveal this still wide-eyed girl eager with hands clasped together in perpetual
anticipation of something amazing. Crafted sentences discover pathways bridging
event to event, winding between brick heavy constructs and high-rising
high-flying possibilities. Paragraph portals open on tremendous paradoxes where
I often stay in my quiet moments, enjoying the misfit. Here, I am not an
equation. Here, I can look out to people in my life and scream, “I ain’t a
function of any constant set of variables, yo!” and I
won’t even feel guilty about them slang.
I write because I love to laugh
and this life is so much funnier when you try to put into symbol-words this
expansive nebulous intense experience of existing. Consider this overheard conversation:
Girl 1: I love your hair! How do
you keep it so long?
Girl 2: I don’t cut it.
No words could describe the desperate giggle trying to come
out of me as I sit in a cubicle. Or maybe I could say it felt like a full
bladder. (cue incredulous guffaw)
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