A Visit To the Sausage Factory

Sorry, it's not a poem. It's an essay.

                              

　

　

               I need to write. It validates my existence. All of life is profound, I believe, and writing of it not only creates a record that I might remember better, it often reveals imprtant intricacies in the devil's details. Possessed by a certain talent, or at least a prominent feature, I feel sometimes inspired, more often obligated (and guiltily procrastinate) to exercise the ability, that it might increase my understanding of God, and, just maybe, lend an empathetic assist to someone else.

               There are several obstacles to the easy accomplishment of satisfying writing. The first is first not because it is the most difficult to overcome, but the easiest, and by far the best excuse. A full time, moderately physical, extremely stressful job is a legitimate, upright and even gratifying cop out. A man's gainful employment is who a man is. Whether this view came about insidiously of society, unavoidably of necessity or was ordained by God Himself is something I have given up struggling to establish. All I know is if a man refuse to work, neither should he eat, and, conversely, I feel much closer to a feeling of accomplishment when I am writing, which pays neither the bills nor feeds the hungry.

               I also know that if I were unemployed, the excuses would become smaller, and yet more plaintive and obstinate, like a difficult child as compared to your average difficult adult. And mentioning children is fortuitous, because it takes us back to the mindset of children, the bane of whose existence was, is, boredom. And boredom, or it's obnoxious French cousin, enui, is the chicken and egg of writer's block. There is almost nothing more painful than beginning to write of some idea or picture or person whose essence has flooded your olefactory creativity and set your sagacious salivary glands seeping and discovering it to be flat and insipid. All meaning of life seems to die with that one captivating vision. Boredom is a horror of the complete absence of stimulation. If I were to say that Hell itself is boring, I would be misunderstood. Boredom is not a yawn, but a frozen, silent scream.

              In the back of every paperback Bantam Louis L'Amour book I've ever read, there is a short bio of the prolific author. Therein is a quote that mocks me. "I could sit in the middle of Sunset Boulevard, and write with my typewriter on my knees; temperemental I am not." As if he feared death by hyperbole as little as he feared death by hit-and-run. At any rate, he seems to thumb his prize-fighter's nose at the notion of any mood or setting required for writing. And well he might have, considering the 105 published works he had authored at the time of his death. And while he has been accused of being formulaic, most (myself included) aspiring writers would give ten years of their life to achieve the success of one of his ubiquitous little paperbacks. My own personal manifestation of the temperemental artist is not prosaic. I only wish it were. A mood or a setting would be far easier to establish than the shooting stars of my infrequent imagination are to capture.The conditions required to create my perfect storm of inspiration are not as easy to predict as those requisite to a Category 5 hurricane, a probably unfortunate metaphor. 

               I have tried different methods. I had high hopes for a pricey digital voice recorder I carried with me for all of a week on my delivery route. James Herriot's heir apparent would be unearthed in the form of a lowly UPS driver. My route is rural, and I had at least as much experience as the English veterinarian did with narrow roads and dragging gates, and a lesser, though still extensive, knowledge of the eccentricities of farm pets. But I discovered something anew about myself. I cannot speak, even to a voice recorder, the way I can write. And even if I could, I wouldn't. I would feel like a lonely fool.

                The fourth reason is lack of experience. Thoreau would have been more accurate in my case if he had said Men lead lives of disquieting dissipation. My life has been what even I would call mostly uneventful. This makes writing more of a challenge. Although it's possible to write a sleep inducing version of a fascinating incident, it is easier to write a sleep inducing version of a life comprised of work, eat and sleep and driven by everyday necesseties. I do believe the acid test of a good writer is his power of observation. A keen enough mind can spellbind an ADHD mind with a vivid, insightful description of paint peeling, if not paint drying. But that sort of writing presents a challenge. An unusual event can make a good story simply by being an accurate narrative but a thoughtful description and/or analysis of a common occurence can shed light on life's deepest enigmas.

             And so, I carry on. Knowing that the secret is not a secret. It is hard work. Whoever said (if anyone, in fact, has) that good writing is relaxing is at least as thoughtful as Louis L'Amour's heroes are humble and self-effacing.