The Empty Page

Picture credit: Filosofias filosoficas,

I’ve been staring at a blank page on my monitor for the last 10 minutes.

It’s not that I don’t have ideas. I do.

There have actually been many of them rolling around in my head recently. After a long time spent scraping the bottom of my barrel of creativity, this is a welcomed surprise.

Here’s the thing about writing: the words don’t always listen to you, and the characters are even more incorrigible.

The expressions on people’s faces when you tell them that is priceless.

Wait, what? How? Can’t you make your characters and plots do exactly what it is that you want them to do, nothing more and nothing less? 

No.

Well, sometimes you can. I’ve written stories that slid out of my keyboard as smoothly as if I were transcribing someone else’s memories of something that really happened a long time ago in a faraway place.

You can’t count on that, though. Every empty page is unique.

I wonder if singers feel the same way about the notes they’re about to sing, or if painters sit and think about all of the possibilities before dipping their brushes into a brand new jar of paint.

Here’s hoping they do.