Awakening the Muse... Writing Essentials

Will and Ariel Durant, in their book, “Interpretations ofLife” (1970), depicted the lives of artists who stand noticeably in the pantheon of greatness. One of the themes that became clear to me was that many of our most creative people were decidedly weird. More gently put, they were special and found special foundries in which they pounded out their works of art which often involved scorching pain. Substance abuse, excoriating personal tragedies, and personality disorders were as common among them as the genius they shared. 

I’m not one to support substance abuse. My personal experiences belie their effectiveness. Not that I’ve had that many, mind you; just enough to destroy the myth. One night I wrote a poem that was clearly a masterpiece. I had finally done it, the holy grail was in my words, on my paper. Then I had the poor judgment to awaken. Sober. My lord, I thought, what do these words mean? So, there you have it. No muse in the booze. 

What does work for me is cycling. I think it’s the increased blood flow. As Amy pointed out in her introductory essay, getting fresh air and working the sinews, bones, and muscles often works and if it doesn’t, you’ve at least earned some chocolate ice cream. Actually, I prefer vanilla. 

Delving into scientific texts seems to stimulate my creative energies. How can you not be inspired by reading, for example, that we, human beings, evolved from dead neutrinos? I mean how incredible does that sound? Or to read that theoretical physicists now generally agree that there are parallel universes? Some people find it hard to believe in a omniscient god but believe in 13 parallel universes! That excites my imagination and begs me to comment somehow on my own madness.

 If you don’t feel like reading scientific texts, watch documentaries. Then you get the facts right smack in your eyes, your brain will purr, your thoughts will blur but in the mix you see something that says, “how poetic or how stupid is that?” Its not always a neat and pretty or sensible thing that will get you penning again. You do remember writing with pens, don’t you? 

If you’ve read my stuff, you must know that I’m old enough to look back at my experiences and see many things. Not all of what I find is compatible with the image I have of myself so that tension drives me to the Mac G 5, too. Resolving our contradictions is not only therapeutic it can be art. 

There are other things I do and use but if I tell you, I’dhave to… you know the rest.