Why write?

Sometimes I wonder why I feel the need to write. What drives writers - wanna be and big time - to write? It's been said that writing is a yoga - a practice. And that true writers, ones in practice rather than in name, write. That is what they do, whether or not anyone reads what they write, if they even write for public consumption. It is like breathing; if you don't do it you really miss it after a while...


I love words and ideas. Maybe that's why I write....at least why I write some of the time. And I've been collecting words for nearly two decades. Capturing quotes and keeping them hidden away for my own enjoyment, pulling them out to add to them or pick a favorite to use in something I'm working on. I always intended to "do something" with the entire list someday. The idea of a book flitted around the back of my mind, but that was so expected, done so many times. What could I add? And that was important, I needed to add something to demonstrate my worth, my skill, my - what? Presence, perhaps? 


Anyway, I had let several months of quotes pile up without adding them to my collection. So I dug in today to get caught up. The process itself a practice, a meditation. I would see that I had accomplished something. In the middle of doing this, I came across a quote that I had to share here...


"You write to communicate to the hearts and minds of others what's burning inside you. And we edit to let the fire show through the smoke." 
-Arthur Plotnik, editor and author (b. 1937)


Yep, that's true. I write - often struggle to write - to get what's inside of me out. Then I throw it away because it's not worthy of seeing the light of day. But every time I push the "publish post" button, I can feel the fire burning off the smoke just a bit more.  

Aha

I was asked a question last week that moved me to tears. It goes to the heart of blooming where one is planted.

In many ways my mother had a difficult life. Some of it was - as I've learned as an adult - a result of her own actions, some of it was due to the inevitable vagaries we all face in life simply because we are alive. The former can be the seeds of regrets, the latter the burdens we have to bear. Without going into the specifics of each of these categories, let me just say that the conversation I had last week involved speculating on some of her actions and choices so they fall into the former category.

The person I was talking to, who never knew my mother and has only others' perspectives to go on, asked me a question I had apparently never considered. It was: "do you think your mother was happy?" For whatever reason those seven words knocked the wind out of me. Snatches of conversations past with my mother floated into my consciousness as did  images of situations with her over a lifetime. What paraded through my mind resulted in a less certain answer to that specific question than I would have hoped. All these things that had been in memory (accurate or not) showed a picture that had never taken this particular shape before. Yet I had a new insight into a woman who died a lifetime ago but who is still often with me and who I still miss talking to. I suddenly saw her as my inspiration for blooming where you are planted. For letting go of the past you cannot change and making the best of what you have in the moment, wherever you are. For crafting a good (even if not fully happy) life with what is available rather than seeking to recreate the lives and happinesses of others.

Perhaps I'm romanticizing what was undoubtedly at times very difficult. As was pointed out by another friend recently, we can never really know our parents - or anyone - people are just too complex and multi-faceted. We can barely know ourselves. However this insight into how and why my mother lived as she did feels right and I accept it gratefully.