Alas it has hit me. I staved it off for 29 days, but today it reared its ugly head. Writer’s block. The well has run dry. Each day for the last 29, I have sat down, and something came forth from my fingers to the keyboard. I had faith that if I sat down, it would come. And it did. For 29 days. Some days needed a little nudging by scrolling through the list of ideas I began at the beginning of the challenge and added to throughout. Or, if more inspiration was needed, I would look to the writers that had already posted before me. But always, it came. Almost effortlessly. I was a bit shocked myself and also very grateful. Then last night, I went to bed, and woke up many times, wondering what I could write about the next day. I started sentences in my head only to turn to sleep on my side and declare them unworthy. What happened? I scroll through my idea list and either the ideas still left are too old, too vague or too painful. 

 

Finding an idea to write about has always been a struggle for many students I have had over the years. I have tried to support them with brainstorming lessons, mentor texts and lots of encouragement. There is always one or two students that seemed paralyzed by the act of generating an idea to write about. The minutes of writers workshop would tick by and as I passed by their desk, they would sit stoically, pencil clasped tightly in hand and a blank page in front of them. I would encourage them to just start writing. Write about anything. Write about how you have nothing to write about. It will lead you somewhere. So today, I followed my own advice. 

 

The same thing sometimes happens when I sit down to paint a small piece of art. The blank, clean, rough watercolor paper stares back up at me. I prep the materials, water in an old coffee mug, paint brushes of various sizes laid out on paper towels, ready to be blotted dry. And I stare. Just as in writing, I think to myself what do I want to express? What is inside of me that wants to come out? What is important to say, here, now, at this moment? And if I can separate those questions from someone actually reading, looking at what I make, I can move beyond the blank page. It is the audience, the eyes, the ears that cause me to hold my fingers lightly atop the keyboard, not pressing, or paintbrush in the cup, swirling and swirling over and over again. 

 

I remember reading a quote once from one of my favorite authors, Sandra Cisneros, about how she overcomes the looming reader-audience challenge that can stifle any writer or artist by imagining herself, in her bathrobe at her kitchen table reading her work. I remember thinking that sounds much less scary. I just tried to google that quote to check my memory and could not find it, but instead found this. “ Pick some topics you’re afraid to talk about, afraid to think about.” Time to start working on tomorrow, my final piece.