Fifteen Days

The coffee has finished brewing and sits waiting for me. All I have to do now is go get it.

The computer sits in front of me, blank page expecting. All I have to do now is fill it.

Some days that's harder than others.

It's not that I don't have ideas. I do. Maybe too many. The problem is days of unexpected emergencies and too little sleep have befuddled my brain, making it difficult to find the right words to bring to life the stories swirling around in my mind like nebulous clouds. Each time I reach out to grab one, it slips through my fingers, eluding me once again.

But that's all right.

At least I have the stories.

I know they were there all along, but for a long while I ignored them. Too busy robotically making my way through hectic yet uninspiring days. Uninspiring, perhaps, because I simply wasn't paying attention.  I wasn't living the life of a writer.

For the last 15 days that has all changed. Driving in my car, walking across campus, sitting in my classroom, I'm writing, albeit in my head. Sometimes a line will come to me and I will curse the fact that you can't write while driving 50 mph. (There's no actual law that states that, I don't think, but it doesn't seem like a good idea anyway.) There have been times when I have repeated lines over and over and over again, trying desperately to hold on to them until I can safely capture them within the lines of the notebook I carry in my purse.

Fifteen days ago I realized how silent I have been. And in the silence, life slips away.

So, I write. Even when I'm not sure what to write or how to write it, I write. Through my words, I try to catch moments and feelings and make sense of a world I do not understand. 

Through my words, I live.