Drive

Tonight, I'm trying so hard to write, but it's not happening. It's just...not. Fumbling to find music, to find my groove. I had forgotten how this feels, this block sensation. More like a job rather than a labor of love, of passion.  One minute, creativity and excitement surges through veins at the thought of where to go to next. Then. Then! Nothing. Nada. Breaks squeal.  It's such a let-down, too, when ideas won't let you catch them long enough to bring them to life. 

If tonight were another time in my life altogether, I would take this moment and go for a Drive.  Like other humans, though, I am a creature of habit and so I rarely get out after dark.  Back before days of children and dishes and 3 loads of laundry every day easily, I would have rolled the top back, popped in a mix tape, put on my life belt, and started the engine to clear my head and heart.     

You see, during the process of conjuring up a piece, I really do take it to heart. I think about something, put my song of choice on loop, on repeat, and let it transport me back to a specific moment or time in space, and let 'er rip. It isn't always as smooth as I'd like, so I'll go back occasionally and revise, but that is how I usually create.  The first path is not always the smoothest to travel, so you put it in reverse and roll back over it again, slower and ever so careful of the pot holes and bumps. 

Too, just like a painter gone mad, the scene slowly unfolds into action and before we know it, Eureka, we HAVE something.  Whether it is recognizable to others, though, is what transforms lives, even our very own.  Identifying with others through art is, and has been over the course of thousands of years, a very thorough and intimate subject over which to bond.  Just why do you think there are book clubs?  Those women aren't there to read books foremost, of course they are not.  They are there for the connections they feel with like-minded individuals.  It goes like this:  You see something, they see something, and BOOM, an instantaneous familiarity is suddenly there, but not quite an elephant in the room.  A shared experience.  A bond.  Art as whatever medium, music of whatever genre, cuisine from every continent, fashions of every era.  It's all art, and our connections with one another in our quest for camaraderie are merely the brush strokes that bring it all together.  Up close, it does not look like much.  Back off a little and observe, and it all makes sense.  Finally, something clicks.   It is as if you recognize yourself again.