The alarm blares before the sun rises. I hit snooze—just once. Is it morning already? I stare at the ceiling, digging deep for the resolve to move. The world waits, my family needs me, and my to-do list could break the will of a champion. My mind races as I go through the steps. Lunches to make, contracts to review, emails to answer. Meetings to attend, legal counsel to give, paperwork to settle. Groceries to buy, laundry to fold. And that’s just the start of it. It’ll be a miracle if I get it all done.
But first, writing.
The silence of the house hums as I sit down to stare at the blank page.
I’ve been a writer since I can remember. In fact, I don’t recall a time I didn’t write. I was making up stories before I learned to print my name. Stories have always been the way I’ve made sense of the world. They were the escape hatch, the adventure calling, the mystery unraveling. A life in pages and stanzas and prose that bled and wept in ways I can’t explain. I’ve got the pages, the disk drives, the binders, the notebooks, the old napkins with doodles of words to show for it. Lost ideas, new ideas, memories long forgotten. Characters that live and breathe in me and with me, waiting for their day to shine.
Photo courtesy of WHAT’S GOIN’ ON?! SLN Publishing, LLC: A Collection of Sarah Crowne Works from 1986-2003
But writing is hard. It’s bleeding on the page. Learning the rules. Mastering them. Breaking them. Staring at a sentence—changing it three times, then five times more. Questioning. Doubting. Deleting. Retyping. Filled with fear. It takes real stamina to sit in that chair, pouring out your soul. It’s leaping off cliffs, growing your wings on the way down. Diving into the depths of the ocean, even when you can’t swim. Chiseling away, your art the page. Tip tapping the keys as the clock ticks and you stare at the wall and wonder: Maybe I’m no good. Maybe no one will care. But you write anyway, because you have to. Because writing is breathing. And to breathe is to live.
And that’s just the first five minutes.
The other day, someone told me that no one reads books anymore. They said:
“I know no one that reads books or keeps them after reading. No one has bookshelves, and if they do, they are for trinkets.” And so I said, “How unfortunate for them.”
Because what else is there to say to a comment like that? How can I give them the solace of a well-worn page, the thrill of discovery within it, if they are not open to it?
Henry David Thoreau once said, “[b]ooks are the treasured wealth of the world and the fit inheritance of generations and nations . .. for what are the classics but the noblest record thoughts of any man . . . We might as well not study Nature because she is old.”*
How many writers have toiled at the page, by candlelight, flashlight, florescent light, sunlight . . . writing in the dark. In corners and rooftops and tiny desks in corners, by windows, inside, outside, in bed, out of bed, while standing, sitting, dreaming. I once wrote an entire novel in my mind while driving to work day after day. I’m sorry I didn’t write it down.
But why? For what purpose? Why do I write?
I thought about this the other day, at the gym. Writing, like physical training, is an act of persistence. I hate going to the gym, but love having gone. Progress always feels slow—running on a treadmill, moving but going nowhere. Lifting weights, muscles aching, strength growing so slowly. I want results now. Why do I have to wait?
And so, as I thought about this, doing my sets, I noticed the people around me. All shapes, all sizes, all ages, all sorts of outfits. Fit, lean stars, their feet hitting the treadmill with calculated steps that kept perfect time with their breath. Others just trying to get through their workout (like me) without collapsing. I even saw a man, his cane leaned up against the weight machine as he lifted weights, building the strength in his forearms. And that’s when I realized. Why do I write? I write for the same reason athletes, of all skills, shapes and sizes stretch themselves and their abilities at the gym.
To get my power back.
And to help others find theirs.
Stories are power. They are God’s way of telling us, See, you’re not all that different.
Because, as Thoreau said, “The universe is wider than our views of it.”
That’s why, before the first light touches my window—and long after it fades—I write. One word at a time. Over and over. Jumping off cliffs. Growing my wings. Ready to fly.
Maybe it’s time for you to leap, too. Grow your wings.
What are you waiting for?
Till Next Time,
Sarah
AKA A Busy Lady
Writing as long as I can remember. Me too. Is it possible writers are born to write?