Thursday, August 1, 2013

Good Morning World!

French Creek at Sunrise
(I missed it, I was sleeping.)
Okay, so it's not morning any more, but for me and other not-so-much morning people, close enough. I've always wanted to be a morning person and a writer. I want to be a writer who gets up in the morning and writes! Though it eludes me, I hold on to hope...I just came across this quote and I'm loving it. Perhaps it's the magic key.
"If you stuff yourself full of poems, essays, plays, stories, novels, films, comic strips, magazines, music, you automatically explode every morning like Old Faithful. I have never had a dry spell in my life, mainly because I feed myself well, to the point of bursting. I wake early and hear my morning voices leaping around in my head like jumping beans. I get out of bed to trap them before they escape." - Ray Bradbury

Finally -- here is the solution, the answer to my life long quest to be a morning person! All I have to do is stuff myself full of all those wonderful things by day and by night, and then boom -- I'm gonna be bounding out of bed in the morning to write prolific poignant prose, maybe even some poetry.

Will I head to the computer to capture all the brilliant thoughts jumping around in my mind before my morning coffee? No, I'll put the coffee on first, and swim, and do a little devotional of some sort, and shower and dress. While I'm at it I'll scrub the tub and gather laundry. If it's been a week or so I'll quick change the sheets on the bed. Oh, and I'll do my hair, which only takes five or so minutes, but if I let it dry on its own it gets wild and unruly. The phone will ring and I'll answer it and chat for a bit too long, but really, relationships with friends are part of my soul food, so that counts. By the time I've got the washing machine running -- mid-morning now -- I'll realize I'm starving. Make a quick bowl of oatmeal, check email, drip a second cup of coffee and call (another) friend, because who wants to sip coffee all alone? While on the phone I can empty the dishwasher, take a peek at Facebook and make a couple of moves on Words with Friends, switch washer to dryer and throw in another load.

Now where was I? Oh yes, on my way to write. I'll just fold those clean clothes, pick out some cards for overdue thank you notes and upcoming birthdays. I'm not going to write and send them, just put them on the table with unsorted mail to take care of later, making a mental note to buy a few belated cards, and fix a sandwich for lunch. With the mail, cards and folded clothes there's no room at the kitchen table for my laptop, lunch and cup of tea, so I'll move to the family room, fold a blanket, straighten the throw pillows and settle in to eat and -- to write.

Now what was it I was going to write about? It was something really good, I know it was really good, worthwhile, important -- but what was it? Good grief, I'll grab a book to replenish the muse, which I know full well will lead to nodding off -- but just for a quick power nap.

"Quick" is my recurring theme. And no matter how quick I do things the day keeps moving along and time gets away.  I really wanted to stuff my head and my life with poems, essays, plays, stories, novels, films, comic strips, magazines, and all that jazz. And then I wanted write about it, but time ran out...today. Oh well, there's always tomorrow. Maybe I'll get up to see the sunrise.



3 comments:

Kristine Riddle said...

Just remember - if you take a picture of the sunset and call it the sunrise...no one can tell the difference!
You don't have to be a morning person to be a writer, you just have to, well, write. Which you do - quite well I might add. :)

Betsy Henning said...

Kristine, you are brilliant -- sunrise, sunset who would know? Thanks for always encouraging me!

Sarah Rose said...

I like Kristine's thinking! :) Great blog today, Betsy!