I firmly believe that people are born to be writers. Sure, anybody can put words together, and anybody can edit them into something meaningful, but writers are a breed apart. We live writing, it consumes us. There is something burning away inside out hearts, our minds and our soul that just makes us write. It forces our hand, and whether we want to or not, whether we publish our work, destroy it, spend out lives editing the same piece of text over and over, or just hide it away in a small dark room for our eyes only, we must do it… we must write.
For me, this goes even further, I have a need to write things down. I list things, to do list’s at work, or making notes for things that don’t need to have notes made of them.
At work, someone asks me to check my customer’s databases for something. I only have 4 customers, and have had them for the whole 2 years I have been here. Rather than just check it, I write their names down so just that I can write them. I don’t cross them off, I rather write a note next to them saying, ‘Checked’ or ‘Done’.
When checking work, either my own or my colleagues, instead of just typing up my comments, I write everything down by hand, and then type it up after I am done. I go through more notepads and pens than anybody in the office, simply because I have this continuing, burning need to write. I do it unconsciously. I pick up a pen and write words, random words.
I try to tell myself that it is because I am a writer, because seeing words written, on paper or typed is just something I need. It keeps me calm, makes me feel safe and secure. Words comfort me, creating them, putting them down helps to streamline my thoughts.
I can multitask quite well (without sounding too pretentious) but still, I like to write everything down. Even when I have no time, or a tight deadlines, I write. My handwriting gets worse and worse, until it looks like the chicken scribble of a doctor in the middle of a caffeine rush, but still, I have to put that pen to paper.
Is it just me, am I nuts? Actually, don’t answer that, I know I’m absolutely bonkers, but that is outside the scope of this level of word obsessed nuts.
What I find even strange is I don’t keep a journal. But, oh, how I would love it… I feel another post coming on.
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lol – I can’t bear to write longhand! I’ve been typing for so long that I almost need the click of those keys to focus my thoughts. Mostly though I just dislike the physical action of writing with a pen. I still do it because I refuse to type and print to-do-lists or shopping lists… but I resent it!
I think you are a writer born Alex. Me, I’m not so sure about.;)
you are just as much of a writer as I Andrea, I have read some of your work, and it is excellent!
lol – thank you but I’m the kind of writer who can get distracted from writing by…oh, wanting to get out into the garden or online gaming or other things 😀 I have to work at wanting to write. See?
I’m with you, Alex, I am obsessed with writing to-do lists and notes! I have 3 notebooks on the go at the moment, I have a stack of diaries written during the course of my teen years through to my current life. I have also recently started a separate shaman journal for my training and I also have a Book of Shadows for my witchcraft studies. Oh, and I have a notebook filled with occult information from when I learned the Tarot and began to study numerology and astrology… Yep, we have to write, it is certainly in our blood!
That is a lot of notebooks. I would love to start a journal, but fear I may loose my grip on the world around me and just immerse myself in the words too much. I actually have a post ready to discuss the topic.