Thoughts on Change

(Thought-Random)

 
          This past week had just brought us in the east coast sweltering heat like I don't remember- enjoyed by some, cursed by some.... but heat I loved to parallel with the thought of me sweating a river! And I yielded to this feeling which to me was pure bliss - delightful and  sensuous ... till I had to stop myself lest it turned to sin!

        But right now... exactly just now - as I type these words away,  that view from my window kind of clicks itself to a next screen as it unfolds that of ominous dark and heavy clouds threatening to pour at any moment now. The temperature has just made a turnabout to cool, very cool, - and the outside world in now losing light ever so slowly as if to give way to a more majestic ruling power. And I feel like I was transported to another dimension.

         I can't help but marvel at this beauty of God's creation as I soak in the gloom that is permeating the atmosphere.  The green of the trees has now been given a darker hue making them stand out against the greyish darkness of the sky.  I notice the shift from  the gentle sway of their branches to a rather stronger assault on each other.  But now I am zapped back to this earlier vision of these same trees where the sun's light made the  green of their leaves lighter to blend with the white clouds that lined the blue of the heavens. And in the bright of day, in the glare of heat, a new awareness is suddenly impressed on me -  that of change, of temporariness, of non-permanence.   But this is what life is made of, isn't it?   For something to be called living, there is that implication of growth, yes.   And growth, in turn, entails change, I know.  There also may be this so-called dichotomy of animate and inanimate things, so that well, some things do change, some don't.

           But now, this turns things in my world upside down because out there,
           I thought there was only this light that went on burning and
                                           nothing else! 
           I thought there was only this word constantly!

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Is There a Best Time for Writing?

(Thought - Random)

           Sometimes I ask myself:  why ever do I write?  Do I for the pleasure of my pen gliding through my paper or for the musical cadence from my computer keyboard? Is it because I want to tell a story or is it because there is a story to tell? ..... because I want to remember... or rather because I'd want to forget?  I don't know.   No, I'm not sure - that's what it is.  But perhaps I could venture to describe the feeling writing gives me as a beatific or even seraphic rapture. Almost unexplainable for me and kind of beyond my senses.

        But whatever it is that I write about,  most often than not,  depends on the time of day that I do.  People, of course, variegate on a  number of varied aspects and the best moment for writing doesn't escape the list.   Some, for instance, write best at dawn -  2 o'clock in the morning or about 4.... a couple more of minutes  before that magical sunrise.  Some go for the dead of night, starting, say, between the witching hours of 11 and 1.  Some sit down for it at about 4 in the afternoon and go on while the sun sets and on to the night.  Still, others go for that tight span of time before going to a specific commitment like work, a speaking engagement, an interview.   I've also heard of some being able to write only within the embrace of darkness;  some only when close to the sound of running water; and some when music, soft or deafening, is available in the background.  Idiosyncratic? I'd say, yes!  Everybody knows about Edgar Allan Poe as being able to write only when dead drunk!

        So when might  be the best time for  writing?  Well,  if I were to talk about myself,  I'd confess that I do all the above one time or another; that is, except being dead drunk ... although I have in mind to try that some time. I know of  some writers who put themselves on a rigid schedule - something like choosing a particular time of day and sticking to it on a regularity, whether or not they are productive.   I mean, they just have to write something like a page or two, or write a specific number of lines - whether or not they like what they have written at all.   But it turns out that after some time, great poetry, or great fiction is generated out of such scribbling, if it may be called such.

        Now I'm not sure if I could do that.  For me, there are random times as when I sit down  in a coffee shop to enjoy how my coffee satiates both my taste and smell pleasures - and  I decide then and there to jot down exactly what feeds my senses that very moment.   I'd see the color of the grass and the skies from out of the window...notice the  people as they go in and  out,  listen inadvertently to greetings, discussions, arguments.  And these are a handful... enough to make my pen work a while.  Other times,  I sit down at my cellphone's call and as a text message flashes before my eyes,  my mind travels past the shadow of the friend who just texted me to remembrances of thoughts, activities, and feelings he has shared with me -and I have a handful.... enough to make my pen work a while.  What I am saying is that random times can open up my eyes to a waterfall of ideas available right on my hands and at my disposal.

          Of course, the flash of inspiration is one that comes at most unguarded moments - inspiration that I must catch and write about immediately lest I lose it. These are the times when I have the nicest, most appropriate words to work with come effortlessly and most languidly,  Unfortunately, these magic moments  come only when they decide to and not when I'd want them to. Which makes it just one more of the good times for writing. In other words, if you ask me - there would be not just one best time for writing because for me, there are a whole lot of these good times.  Definitely, the 'best time' would be any of those times when my heart and my mind are at their complementing best... very much like I would look into the yin and yang of tai-chi.

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A Visit to the Writer's Chapel

(Thought-Random)

        The writers start filing into the chapel, located in a dark cafe.  On the wall are the workshop commandments:

        DO NOT TAKE THY WRITING IN VAIN.

REMEMBER THE WORKSHOP DAY AND DO NOT BE TARDY OR ABSENT.

HONOR THY INFLUENCES.

THOU SHALT NOT PLAGIARIZE.

THOU SHALT NOT BEAR FALSE CRITICISM AGAINST THY WORKSHOP NEIGHBOR

THOU SHALT NOT COVET THY WORKSHOP NEIGHBORS OEUVRE, ALTHOUGH GUSHY APPRECIATION IS FINE.

        When the room is full, they sit down at Paris cafe tables, open their manuscript books, and simultaneously bellow an excerpt from a work-in-progress; a joyful noise fills the room.
        They turn to the Book of Common Prose and read:

                Oh muses forgive us for we know not what we write.
                We have only working drafts to show for our trials.
                We have sinned in our procrastination, laziness, im-
                precision of language, failure of courage and imagi-
                nation, and overall lack of will.  Please grant us the 
                language to make bad experiences into good stories.
                Bless us with images,the stubbornness to carry on,
                the fortitude to forego unjust criticism, and the gen-
                erosity of spirit to praise the work of others.


        They take communion of a sip of espresso and a symbolic drag on an unlit cigarette.  On their way out, some stop by the Confessional Poem booth, where they recite a self-indulgent, autobiographical screed without fear of derision.
      
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From Alan Ziegler's The Writing Workshop

Mi corazon insiste - JenCarlos Canela