Wednesday, September 11, 2019

11 September 2012

Max

I handed in my final script last night for my course. it nearly killed me.

I wrote all weekend until 9pm Sunday. then hated it.

so I started another piece, and didn't have the ending by the time I went to sleep.

dreamt all night of lines and ideas.

woke up, still with no ending.

had real work to do all day, no writing.

drove a workmate home to Perth, chatted all the way about the piece, found the ending.

handed it in. re-read it at home, I still like the piece. four typos.

like you, I was on the beach on Saturday around noon, trying to write. trying. failing.

Joey

Of course, writing at the beach didn’t work ... sand gets into the typewriter keys and messes up the ink ribbon. All the effort of lugging your Underwood through the sand dunes for not much reward ...

Max

ahahahaha, I would like to point out that that delightful reply would only work if I had said I was typing on the beach.

as it was, there was enough sand to blot my parchment, more than enough, it's just that I never really put quill to parchment because I was not inspired. also, the parchment kept rolling up when it wasn't flapping, the quill seemed to want to fly out of my hands and soar with the seagulls and the ink yearned to sink into the sand and run to the sea, to paint the waves with my words.

so I realised that the seasons only really describe the big changes in our lives, and the waves illustrate more closely the daily heartbeat of our lives, so I went and stood in the wash to absorb some heartbeats to put into my writing. then I went home and typed ... :)

the coda to the thought about the waves is that we are also never really at the tip of the wave, nor on the break nor at the base - we are always tumbling along in the middle. Nothing is ever smooth. But there is a beat. And that is what makes us feel at home even in the tumble of the daily waves.

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