9/17/13

What do people who aren't writers feel instead of inspiration? When they look up and the sky is clear and the breeze is soft and every breath feels like laughter? When the room is dark and the songs bleed passion and the energy makes you want to cry? When the line is funny and the smile is crooked and the sounds of life clutter your ears?

Surely they don't feel NOTHING. Surely writers don't just have a sixth sense, a tap into a whole separate layer of life.

That is what it feels like, though. Like a runner's high. You break through and everything is different. You access a different layer of experience. Everything is beautiful. Everything. Even things you recognize, and would describe as, ugly are beautiful in that Writer way. It's like you're made of goosebumps.

It's weird, because while you want to be so completely present, tap into every single aspect of the world right then, you also don't want to be disturbed, involved. Like, for God's sake, don't talk to me. Just exist and leave me alone and let me revel in the fact that you're alive, and I'm alive, and everything about life is so...delightful.

I wonder if I'm even allowed to talk like this. I don't follow through on my stories; most of my papers end up being pretty halfassed. The only times I write consistently are on my blog and in my journal, and those aren't avenues for "real" writers. Anyone can--and does--do those things.

 But honestly, I do FEEL like a writer. And I don't think that feeling can be wrong. Anyone who writers is a writer, by definition.

But then you have Writers. A Writer is a Writer no matter what she does or where she goes or how she feels. It's as inescapable as being female. Sometimes you might not feel feminine; sometimes you might hate the hassles of being a girl; sometimes you can pretty successfully conduct yourself like a guy. But you're a female, and at the end of the day you have to come back to it.

A Writer is not defined by her occupation, or how she dresses, or how many words a day she can crank out. A Writer is defined by how her mind works, and the existence of those delightful, goosebump moments where the world collides with her mind in a breathtaking array of impressions.

I am a Writer not because I write, but because...I am.