Blank
I’ve just spent the past 45 minutes staring at a blank screen and a blinking cursor. You’d think after a few weeks that I’d be able to come up with just an ounce of something, but the only thing moving is my battery indicator. It’s running down like the witch’s hour glass on the Wizard of Oz, counting time before it shuts down completely and leaves me alone. Speaking of alone, I’m quite that this morning here at the beach. It’s kind of odd. Only the lights and the barista’s seem to know this place is open. Of course the fireplace doesn’t…but I promised my wife that I’d leave that dead horse to rest in peace. I’m not sure why I keep coming here except for the big comfy chair, and the fact that they open so early. Maybe it’s an indication that the rest of the world went back to real jobs with real working hours this week. It’s only me and a few cops in here right now and since we’re a bit low on donuts, I’m thinking that it’ll be just me pretty quickly.
So…………..what to write about? It’s the start of a new year…a few days late, but hey at least I’m in the right month. I could celebrate here the “dawn of a new day”…yay!!! Wooohooo!!!, wow nearly hurt myself. Never mind, I guess the age of Aquarius will just have to get on without me. Whatever… aren’t writers supposed to write about such things, new beginnings and auld lang synes and all that stuff. I’m just tired and seeking refuge trying to suck the last ounce of caffeine from a grande drip extra black coffee while I curse the cursor on a blank screen. The Eagles are in my headphones trying to trick me into thinking that I’m 20 years younger than I really am while my body is filing a protest against such foolishness. I know that the illusion is false if for no other reason than that, 20 years ago, this chair would be forming around my butt and this morning, in my present reality, my butt is forming around the chair.
By now it’s obvious to even me that the blank is disappearing from my page and being filled with characters, as is this Starbucks. The usuals are beginning to filter in. I guess if you wait long enough, all becomes right with the world again and what was once blank begins to take form and resemble something recognizable. That’s my hope I guess, as I look on the blank slate of this year that lies ahead. Really, I guess that I could and should consider this a blank page on which just about anything can be written. It’s an unknown page in my story. As G.K. Chesterton once observed, if life is a story, then there is a storyteller. Sometimes I try desperately to write my own pages and sometimes I feel like Will Ferrell in “Stranger that Fiction” as the storyteller reads my life. Unlike him though, my life progresses much more positively when the storyteller is leading the activity.
So as this previously blank page has now, somehow, been filled, my life and yours will be filled as day passes day. Each and everyone has the chance to “be all that you can be” even without joining the army. Clear your calendars, give yourself over to the storyteller, stop cursing the cursor, keep your hands and feet inside at all times, and enjoy the ride.
So…………..what to write about? It’s the start of a new year…a few days late, but hey at least I’m in the right month. I could celebrate here the “dawn of a new day”…yay!!! Wooohooo!!!, wow nearly hurt myself. Never mind, I guess the age of Aquarius will just have to get on without me. Whatever… aren’t writers supposed to write about such things, new beginnings and auld lang synes and all that stuff. I’m just tired and seeking refuge trying to suck the last ounce of caffeine from a grande drip extra black coffee while I curse the cursor on a blank screen. The Eagles are in my headphones trying to trick me into thinking that I’m 20 years younger than I really am while my body is filing a protest against such foolishness. I know that the illusion is false if for no other reason than that, 20 years ago, this chair would be forming around my butt and this morning, in my present reality, my butt is forming around the chair.
By now it’s obvious to even me that the blank is disappearing from my page and being filled with characters, as is this Starbucks. The usuals are beginning to filter in. I guess if you wait long enough, all becomes right with the world again and what was once blank begins to take form and resemble something recognizable. That’s my hope I guess, as I look on the blank slate of this year that lies ahead. Really, I guess that I could and should consider this a blank page on which just about anything can be written. It’s an unknown page in my story. As G.K. Chesterton once observed, if life is a story, then there is a storyteller. Sometimes I try desperately to write my own pages and sometimes I feel like Will Ferrell in “Stranger that Fiction” as the storyteller reads my life. Unlike him though, my life progresses much more positively when the storyteller is leading the activity.
So as this previously blank page has now, somehow, been filled, my life and yours will be filled as day passes day. Each and everyone has the chance to “be all that you can be” even without joining the army. Clear your calendars, give yourself over to the storyteller, stop cursing the cursor, keep your hands and feet inside at all times, and enjoy the ride.
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