Searchlights & Signal Flares 

What's The Point? Why Write At All?

July 2004 

 

What's the Point? Why Write At All?

 I don't
always have
a point
that anyone else
would recognize.
When I do, it varies. 

To express my mind, my heart,
my knowledge, my thoughts,
my fears, my dreams.  

To leave some of myself behind
for future generations,
especially
my granddaughter
Kendall.  

To share my life
and my faith
with others,
that they may find an answer
(or possibly, not.) 

To reveal the facets
of life in all its glory.  

Why do I write?
I can't help myself.
I think so much better
that way
than I do in my head.
And as I write,
I learn.
I change.
I heal.  

Bottom line.
I'm a writer.
Writing is what I do.
I don't need a reason
and I don't need a reader.
I just write.  
 

Betty Winslow, writing in Bowling Green, Ohio, because she can't help it.
  

Why Write?

     Is anybody listening?

     Will the current carry our bottled message to a populated shore?

     Perhaps the game draws us—the process of stringing words into queues, rearranging them into brilliant configurations, rule following, rule breaking?

     Could it be the sounds of consonants and vowels bumping up against each other, or the scritch of the pen point, the click of the keyboard?

     Immortality?

     Touching antennas?

     The fun of wading in the stream of our consciousness?

     A sense of accomplishment at the sight of a pile of code stacked on a corner of the desk?

     Something to keep us from opening the fridge?

     Maybe it's the sensation of unimpeded flow of gel pen on pristine paper?

 

Jane Merryman, Petaluma

     You might as well ask me why get out of bed in the morning, why bother to dust the coffee table or change my underwear. There's no reason and every reason to write, the best one being it just makes my life better.

     Writing enhances the quality of my life. I see this most clearly after one of the many periods when I neglect to do it. When I start writing again after weeks or months of avoidance, I notice how much more curious I become, how connected I feel to the other people in this world. I see patterns that I previously overlooked. My dreams get better. When I am writing, I am more interesting to myself.

     Of course, there's a part of me that can puff up dangerously large that wants to write in order to be recognized and validated. I guess there's got to be some drive for recognition and status, or I'd never get past the first draft. But when I replace the goal of self-discovery with the desire for self-aggrandizement, the music I try to make is not so tuneful. Writing is only worth pursuing as a means, not an end.

Susan Bono is trying to stay interesting in Petaluma, CA.

Why Bother To Write? 

I bother to write because, when I'm writing, I know who and what I am.

When I'm writing poetry, fiction, or non-fiction prose I believe I'm a writer.

I open my favorite writer's how-to book. From between its worn pages a cherished bookmark reminds me “A writer is someone who has written today.” I'm inspired. I begin.

My fingers shoot across the keyboard during this extraordinary process of think-typing and trigger something magical in my brain. Annoying thoughts, both petty and grand, elope from consciousness. For example, during this process, I don't dwell on, or even think about, tenants, occupants of my beloved former home. My lush, green lawn and spectacular flowerbeds in the front yard? Dead. My perfect English Garden in the back yard? Dog run.

Often, when I bother to write, the mundane and often embarrassing incidents in my real life are temporarily forgotten – like showing up this week for my long-awaited doctor's appointment on Wednesday and being informed, rather impatiently, I might add, that my appointment was last week and on Tuesday.

     When I bother to write I'm suddenly enmeshed in the intriguing company of fictional characters leading fictional lives far different from my own. I'm transported to the past or the future. The choice is mine. I'm living a life on this planet or another. I'm absorbed in a life (and sometimes many lives) that I could not otherwise live.

     I know who my people are, what they think, when and where they live, how they feel and why. I know what motivates their every action. I know what they will do under any given circumstance. In short, I control them – absolutely.

     If control corrupts, then absolute control corrupts absolutely – and I absolutely, maniacally, and gleefully control all my fictional people throughout their entire fictional lives. WOW! In this millisecond of cosmic time (called writing the novel) I am The Fiction Nazi and my people will obey.

     Unless they revolt!

     Hmmm …What if they do?

     Aha! I will kill them!

     But that's another story.

     (And the end of this one.)

 

Pat Tyler, Cotati, CA

     I write to get out of my head and onto paper.  Writing, with a pen or pencil, is an extension of my arm.  When I picture my arm, it's elongated by the pen, which in my mind, is always there. Computer typing --- same thing --- the keyboard is an extension of me.  Writing is as natural and as much a part of me as breathing. I would rather write than do almost anything else. I write because I get to see a side of myself that isn't always present. My daily concerns revolve around household chores, childcare (yes, even though my children are older, there are still daily activities that involve the care and feeding of them). My efficient me bustles about cleaning and scrubbing and waiting until I have a moment or two to write. And those moments are glorious. Because I'm writing for me. Not for any monetary gain. Not for notoriety. I don't need to be noticed to enjoy writing. But I do enjoy reading my work out loud in my writing group.

     Simply, I write because I not only can, I have to.

     The following quote from The Writer magazine, March 2004, eloquently answers the question, “Why write?”

“Why I write . . .

Life often has a way of making people feel small and unimportant. But if you find a way to express yourself through writing, to put your ideas and stories on paper, you'll feel more consequential. No one should pass through time without writing their thoughts and experiences down for others to learn from. Even if only one person, a family member, reads something you wrote long after you're gone, you live on. So writing gives you power. Writing gives you immortality.”

---Antwone Fisher, Screenwriter and author, “Antwone Fisher”. “Finding Fish: A Memoir,” and “Who Will Cry For The Little Boy?: Poems”

 

Marlene Cullen grabs writing moments in Petaluma, California