Of Writer’s Block and Stream of Thoughts by Konnie Enos

 

This has been my day. I open the module for one of my classes and check what assignments I have left to do. Okay, easy enough. The assignment is to read the statements and type a response to anywhere from two to five of them. And it’s not long responses, a short paragraph is all that’s needed.

Okay, read the material, wait for a thought to surface, and type those thoughts up. Easy.

I read all the material. Every statement.

Well, that’s not helpful. Not only do I have no response but not one of them even sparked a kernel of a thought.

So, try the next class and come back to this later.

Seriously, in five of six classes, I had the same type of assignments to do. For each one, I’d read the material and have nothing to say or not enough to say to fill the requirements. Oh, and the sixth class, I’m already done with it for this week.

So, umm, that didn’t go well, what else can I do?

Oh! My post.

So, what do I write about?

Yeah, good question. No answers. I’ve got an extreme case of writer’s block.

After fishing around online for several hours and still having no idea what to write about, I finally opened a blank Word document so I could at least try to write, something, anything.

I ignored it for another hour or so. It’s now so late I should be in bed, but I know if I go to sleep now there is a high probability that I won’t get anything written.

First, close everything else.

Two focus on the blank page.

Three, forget the page as I realize I must yet again go to the bathroom.

I sit on the toilet contemplating my existence and my complete lack of idea. Well, stream of thought. I mean how else do you combat writer’s block.

Guess what your stream of thought is when you have no idea what to write about?

Yep. Writer’s block.

The problem is that it’s not helping. I mean I can string words together in a logical manner but it’s not germinating any concrete ideas.

Part of that might be the late hour. After all, it’s after midnight and I woke up at six today, or rather yesterday. Okay, I woke up at six on Tuesday.

Maybe it’s not just a lack of a muse I’m fighting but tiredness. Not that I’m yawning, but if I stopped moving long enough, I’d be snoring right along with my husband. Of course, falling asleep is always that simple for me. Just get comfortable, close my eyes, stop moving, and then I’m asleep. I can also fall asleep while sitting up and trying to do things. But in those cases, I’m exhausted.

Well, there blows that idea. I am exhausted enough to dose off sitting up and attempting to type. That means it is way past time to be going to bed.

Recap. No, my muse isn’t working. Yes, I’m exhausted.

Now what?

Well, I could attempt to fight this for a few more pages or I could give up for the night and try to get some sleep. Which leads me to type with my eyes closed. Believe it or not, touch typing does work when you have your eyes shut.

That does it. I need sleep. Maybe after a few hours, I’ll be able to—

Nothing like falling asleep in the middle of a sentence. So, I’ve gotten almost enough sleep for one night, maybe I can finish this now. Maybe my muse will wake up.

It’s not looking likely.

Since it’s morning and I’m up and moving around, Mabel is looking at me wondering when I’ll feed her breakfast while I’m hoping I can string together enough more words to form a reasonable post in the few minutes I have left before it is time to feed her and the other “fur babies” in this house.

And I’m still staring at the screen without an idea.

I guess this is one time that nothing is going to work to wake up my muse and I’m just going to have to muddle through.

I think between now and when my next post is due, I’m going to engage my youngest in some conversations. The reason for this observation is Royce has tended to spark the muse with his conversations in the past. Then again, all my children have sparked a post or two over the years.

Well, I must get something posted and it is nearly time to feed our “fur babies” so I’m going with this and hope this rambling stream of thought dump will help spark my muse so I can at least get my homework finished.

Smile. Make the day a brighter day.