Writing ... Seriously

When you haven’t written anything “professional” in quite awhile you wonder if you can ever return to it. You sit at the pc & stare at the blank screen & think of those first few words that will set everything back in motion. That will open the jets of inspiration & melodic word flow & you will be back in business again. And you sit. And you stare. And you type fruitless words that end up meaning absolutely nothing.

I feel like there is something in my brain that is blocking that used-to-be writer inside of me. Not writer’s block by any means as I can sit here & compose at will a whole story or just a ramble. No, its more like I have to find a hole in the wall where I can grab that old creative “professional” writing back out again, which is just behind that doggone wall. I can feel it back there. I can glimpse hints of it. I have words & phrases jumping out at me like there is an article just waiting for me to put down on paper. I just can’t quite reach it with my fingertips yet.

Maybe I’m trying too hard. Maybe I’m putting too much pressure on myself. It was told to me that not only do I have some talent at photography but I have some talent at writing. It would be good for my photography to also write to go along with my photographs. It could open up a whole new world. A world that I had enjoyed very much, come to think of it, way back when.

I was only writing for little underground newspapers & magazines but it was enjoyable to me. And I had the time … at the time. Words flowed out of me sooooo dang easily it was almost pathetic. I wrote album (when they were actually albums) reviews & mini-articles about music. Then I started moving into doing mini-interviews where I could submit like 5 questions for musicians to answer. To me, that was very cool. Its what a “nobody” in the music journalism business could get since we weren’t a “somebody”. Hey, I got to “interview” John Densmore of The Doors, James Young of Styx, Marc Ferrari, someone who had played with Janis Joplin but whose name now escapes me, Shawn Sahm & numerous no-name bands that remained no-name bands.

So now that I am taking my photography more seriously I need to take my writing more seriously. Try to get back what is lurking there underneath not a wall or a stone or even that cute little mushroom. Nope, its just under the skin of my fingertips. If I could prick my finger & let the word-blood flow out onto these keys, I would.

So I have to practice. I have to contrive an article about a band. Find those long ago words from my past that will form an intriguing piece of journalism that will inspire me to put pen to paper again, or rather finger to key, & do something that I have not done in years. An article that will once again cause tears to well up in Gregg Allman’s eyes because my words touched him. And yes, that is a true story; have the hand-written letter from him to prove it.

Can I really, you know, do this again?

BLUR

Music Playing = Muddy Waters