Return and Return

I have a free, unadulterated day. There are no restrictions on my time, no one to be considered in this moment. I am in a rare position to not feel guilty—meaning that there isn’t something I absolutely should be doing instead, weighing on my mind. I am the only one in the house—no husband, no kids. The weather is sunny and breezy; the temperature hangs in the sixties. I lay across the loveseat in front of the double window—my favorite place in the house, besides my bed-- with the breeze blowing over me and the sun warming me. Pandora is running. The dog is napping.

I am supposed to be writing, but I’ve been staring at the blank Word document on the screen, off and on, for two hours now. I don’t care what it is I write—a blog post, another chapter—but there is no movement on any project.

I shift my position on the loveseat, hoping for inspiration.

Nothing will budge.

I get up and wipe the kitchen counters. The smell of lemongrass cleaner wafts through the rooms of the house as the windows work their magic and blow out the smells of a house in winter. I clean the bathroom. I do two loads of laundry. Each time I accomplish a task, I sit back down on the loveseat, and stare for a few moments more at the blank screen. I get back up and dust the kitchen table, then clear the clutter off the ledge between the kitchen and dining room. I sit back down, and still have nothing to write down. I check the mail, throw away the junk before it hits the table, write out three things, and stick the mail back in the box, flag up.

I stare at the computer screen. I contemplate turning on the television, but now that I will get sucked into the meaningless world of daytime programming or HGTV reruns. I get up to move the remote control across the room to make sure I won’t turn it on.

I’ve blown two hours on this back and forth. I straighten the scatterback pillows, visualizing as I do that I am also straightening the untidiness in my mind.

I should be running errands.

I could make cookies.

I am desperately attempting to avoid Pinterest.

Write something! Anything!

It’s often like this. I will wake up on the busiest day of my week with a fantastic idea and the overwhelming urge to write. I can almost feel the creativity vibrating through my body and into my fingertips. There’s something in my brain that clicks on when it knows there’s no chance in hell I can sit down and actually put fingers to keys. Instead I scribble haphazard notes on whatever’s available, and hope that I can elaborate upon them later. I read them days or weeks down the road and I cannot even remember what it was I had attempted to convey.

And when I do everything within my power to make time for writing, or when I inadvertently fall into a solid block of unstructured time, I freeze.

I could never be a full time author, if this is how their days usually progress.

So I sit back down on the loveseat, make myself comfortable, and free associate.

And this is what comes to me.

This post is written in response to Mama Kat’s writing prompt: Your chair. We all have ‘our spot’ in the house…show us where you plant yourself and what is it about that spot that makes it your favorite?