Falling Silent

In an interesting bit of online behavior, my friend Letha Damalis has quit blogging. That’s not so interesting, in itself. After all, I have lately quit writing anything at all. It’s that she had to ask to be forced to quit. Letha chatted with me a few days ago, even though we live three blocks apart. She said that she’s addicted. She can’t stop reading, commenting, replying to comments, meeting people, flaming, e-dating, blogging, all of it. Its too much fun! She said it was getting in the way of her studies, even as she was chatting with me before the day of a law school midterm. I suggested to her that she give it a rest for a while. She said that she would. She also said that she would not, and she didn’t. Today, she has announced that another, cleverer confidant, took over the key to her MySpace account. A new password was set, one that Letha does not know. Her friend will return the password to Letha, when the time is right. Until then, she falls silent. Well, knowing her, she’ll probably hang onto an internet boyfriend or something.

I am not reading, writing, commenting, or replying nearly so much. My friends wonder if I might be up to some sort of superhero mischief. I wish, but no. I promised myself I wouldn’t chime in with a long rant about how awful writer’s block is. I promised I wouldn’t make a list of excuses (work, moving, etc.). Does that mean I can’t even write an explanation? I think it’s ironic, or at least difficult to accept; one of my friends has been forced to quit the wordplay, the constant reading and typing, for her own good. On the other hand, I’m trying to force myself into doing those things, for my own good.

I’m going to write a new short story soon. I won’t whine about the writer’s block, but I will share a tactic that seems to help me get around the problem. I tried my best to approach the creative problem academically, rather than creatively, at least until the demon feelings subside. I’ve been educated to understand things in terms of their parts, and to organize those parts. Stories are no exceptions. They have characters and situations and themes and literary devices… These things are so much easier to think of than “plot”, for me. So I’ll make a list of interesting characters, themes, etc, and I’ll randomly choose one item from each list, and then I’ll work out a story that combines them.

I’m hoping this little compositional trick will do for me what Letha’s new password has done for her – let me get on with my life!