~rhythm and flow~

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What do I write tonight? Once I write, will I click 'publish'? Once I publish it, how many typos or errors or better way of saying something will I discover? How many edits will I apply?

Since May, 2009, I spend many-a-Wednesday night on the telephone with a few other writers, folks who draw letters on a page to form words that create pictures. Or perhaps, like me, they utilize a keyboard to create digital(?) letters that form words to convey pictures. Scenes of life.

What may seem a mundane bus ride becomes a deep experience of life and connections. Or a simple boat ride in the Gulf while viewing piers and birds, put into words, spawns gratitude for life and simplicity. It could be that one works as a cashier and store owner interacting every day with such a variety of people that adventures seem to present themselves as regular occurrences.

In order to have something to write about, one must be relating with an environment.

That thought causes me pause.

What if one is in solitary confinement in a prison? What is that environment?

Wow. I guess it would mainly be with one's self. And with the walls, the floor, the bed or mat, a toilet, a sink. All inanimate objects. Perhaps food is given by someone whose face can be seen, or perhaps all that is seen is the giver's hands or fingers sliding a tray through a slot.

I doubt one would have a keyboard or a pen and paper. But perhaps pencil and paper would eventually be granted.

I think of prisoners in austere circumstances who have stated that keeping their minds active is what helped them to keep going. I've heard one story of a man, I think a POW, who would play 18 holes of golf in his head. That imaginary 18 holes kept his mind sane. Story goes that he was able to play very well after being released from his hell hole. (Upon writing those sentences I googled prisoner who played 18 holes of golf in his imagination and found a Snopes link about it entitled Legend in His Own Mind.)

This past Wednesday in the writing workshop via phone, Fred Poole shared something along the lines that Alphie McCourt writes with pen and paper (as opposed to a computer keyboard) because it takes much more effort to stop the flow of writing. That is with a computer, editing while composing is much easier and more tempting; thus one can interrupt themselves to their own disadvantage.

That's not to say we should all or always compose with pen and paper. But the point is to allow flow.

With a ballpoint pen the ink doth flow.

With a keyboard, fingers click out rhythms.

My mother's name was Flo. Her last name was Drum.
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