On the quest for writing…

Anyone that aspires to writing may be familiar with the lulls that happen from time to time. In my case, I haven’t had any real attempts at writing since suspending efforts in 2006 while pursuing a degree. Well, it’s been a year since the degree was completed, and those months yielded no new material! I had hoped and expected to continue riding on the wave of productive momentum after school was over. So many plans – brush up on the latest and greatest graphic art software, re-do my dad’s website, make progress on a writing project…etc. I knew that all that free time from not having to do schoolwork would become a bounty of completed projects that I just didn’t have time for until then.

Reality…at about the same time I finished my degree, I also changed jobs at work. The new job was an opportunity to grow into a new type of work – and meant a steep learning curve. One year after starting the new job, I’m now starting to feel like I can get some traction on these “other” projects in my life.

I actually think that my brain has been totally overloaded – not only with the new job and all the information that has had to be assimilated…but my continued habit of trying to be super-productive in every waking minute of the day. As a result, my brain just decided to put limits on me if I didn’t. My brain acted independently of my will? Yeah, I think so… it knows best.

Anyway, I’ve been doing “research” to inspire me on the writing project and I’ve been enjoying some books. Lately the selections involve a lot of memoirs to study their style. Thought I’d pass along the reading list for your edification…if your brain allows…

Half Broke Horses,Jeannette Walls,2009
The Glass Castle,Jeannette Walls,2005
Growing Up,Russell Baker,1982
A Moveable Feast,Ernest Hemingway,1964 (about his time in Paris 1921-26)

p.s. I’m a big fan of our local library system… love to check out audiobooks when they are available… originally with that idea I had of constantly being productive, even while driving my car… now it’s a nice alternative to the noise on the radio and a fairly time-efficient way to progress through a book…

p.s.s. I’ve enjoyed the wording of Ernest Hemingway, almost a language that is vanishing… this passage ALMOST convinces me to have some oysters – it is notable that he was consuming them in Paris in the 1920s, which might have something to do with generating a lot of romance around the scenario…despite living for years in Louisiana, the consumption of scavenging bivalve creatures is super-low on my list of preferences…

“As I ate the oysters with their strong taste of the sea and their faint metallic taste that the cold white wine washed away, leaving only the sea taste and the succulent texture, and as I drank their cold liquid from each shell and washed it down with the crisp taste of the wine, I lost the empty feeling and began to be happy and to make plans.”

Better than ”Downing a bunch of raw oysters chased with white wine really perked me up”, don’t you think?