Lost for Words

If you’re a writer, then you know what I mean.  There’s comes a point on the measuring stick of fatigue when you open the document (the document of your amazing work in progress) and you stare at it.  You know exactly where you want to go with it (you’ve left it all the notes) and writing it will be amazing.  That’s what you thought last night anyways.  But tonight?  Tonight it just looks like too much.  The day has been too long, and there isn’t enough left of you for you to create story.  You have nothing left.  There’s no more water in this well. 

Perhaps if you’re a writer you don’t actually know what I mean.  Perhaps you writers out there are wise enough to know that writing should be done in the morning, when you’re fresh.  Maybe you’ve been too smart to face this struggle.  Maybe I’m the only one out there who has ever felt this lost for words. 

But of course, if there’s anything I’ve learned from being around for eighteen years, it’s that people are never quite as unique as they think they are.  Their struggles have all been struggled by others, their problems have all been solved (or not) by those before them, and others have shed tears over the same griefs that haunt them.  There’s nothing new under the sun. 

But isn’t there a lot to be said for individuality?  Of course!  People are amazing, because we beat so many odds, we conquer so many of our battles, and so many of us are able to live incredibly full lives, regardless of the number of years they are given.

But of course, those remarks up there do seem a bit sappy.  A bit too optimistic.  After all, for as many people that are living fully, there are probably two other people wasting their precious gift of life.  Right? 

So you see, if you’re a writer, you probably know what I mean.  When you can’t write, you write about not being able to write.  And then that piece morphs into an opinion piece about humanity.  And of course, in writing a piece 400 words long about how you have no words, you’re sort of proving that you really do have words, just not the right ones.  Never the right ones.

Writers.  Seriously, someone needs to get some sense into them.

But this one needs to go to sleep.  Because the day has left me lost for words.

Spiders

                When a spider lives in a cellar, down in the dank and cold, she doesn’t see many people.  Once in a while a human will climb down her creaking steps. They’ll bend their head to avoid the low pipes and they will search for what they came to retrieve.  In the brief time the person is present, the spider will pause in her web-weaving, and she will observe.

                When a spider lives in the corner of a cottage, she sees humankind on a daily basis.  They bustle about below her, and she hopes they don’t notice her.  If they do, then they’ll tear down her home.  She doesn’t mind that too badly though, she simply moves to a different corner – perhaps higher this time, and rebuilds.  Humans are always around, and this is a hazard that she is prepared to deal with.

                The first spider, the cellar-dweller, rarely sees people.  When she does though, she observes them very carefully.  She watches the way they move, the sounds they make, the tears they cry, and they smiles they beam.  She takes it all in curiously, and stores it away to ponder in the many long hours she spends weaving or waiting alone.

                The second spider is around people all the time.  She takes no special interest in what they do or the way that they do it – this is normalcy to her.  Things simply pass her observation, because after all, she is an expert in people.

                You see, the first spider doesn’t know people at all – she’s barely around them!  The second would be a much better judge of the race called Humans.  

TenWordFiction

“Finished, but not over.” He sighed.  “Blood-stained hands are heavy.”

Ten-Word (or less) Fiction

"No reason to live," Cherie cried, "now I have you."

Five Things I Hate

·         * Public Body Image

·         * Goldfish

·         * Internal Dissention

·         * Hindsight

·         * Abuse

Internal Dissention – the fancy way of saying bickering among the ranks.  Squabbling within the family.  Fighting within the church.  And I absolutely hate it.  I hate when a unit is torn apart because of petty differences; petty differences that could be solved so easily if we would just put aside our pride and arrogance. 

We end up hurting ourselves when we let pride win.  When we pollute our surroundings by our own spite – then we pollute the very air that we must breathe.  We damage ourselves by doing this.  But damaging ourselves is a big part of life, people do it every day.  I’m not saying that I agree with it, it’s always going to happen though.  But when we cannot put aside small differences, then we damage our cause.  Entire regimes have fallen because of the things people could not let go.  Regimes crash every other year though.  What about families?  Those smash every day, every second.  Yet people cannot let go of their irreconcilable differences to save the youth of their child, or the peace of themselves. 

Not all dissention is bad – not every fight can, or should, be avoided.  But when we decide that our own pride is more important than the cause of our loved ones, or our country men – then we make the decision that we are the most important person in our lives.  And when we decide that we are the most important person, we resign ourselves to life-long misery.