The Writer

The writer spent the last few hours doing little more than staring at a blank computer screen… struggling to place words and meaning there which refused to come.

         The writer tried to convince himself that he had to try and get some work done. He tried and failed at it. He succeeded at accomplishing nothing…. An amazing feat he succeeded brilliantly at, lately.

         And the writer’s success at failing succeeded only at making him want to give up.

         The godforsaken weather did nothing to brighten the writer’s cluttered and muddled mindset. It had been a long, cold, depressing winter, and the writer craved bright sunlight and warmer weather. He wished to sit upon the front door and perform his craft in the company of iced tea, salty tater chips and squirrels scurrying along the nearby tree limbs. Mostly, he wanted to sit upon the porch while lovely young women strolled upon the eroding sidewalk, dressed in short-shorts and pleasant smiles. The writer neared an age where he qualified for Dirty Old Man status. While he wasn’t permitted to touch, there was no law against him peeking, glancing, and staring….

         The calendar stated that it was spring, damn it! It was supposed to be spring! The weather told another story. It snowed the first part of April. The wind blew, the snow fell constantly, and it got colder than a witch’s tit! The second part of April was a slight improvement. Mostly it rained. Yet the wind still blew, and naturally it remained colder than a witch’s tit.

         Now it was the first week in May, and the rain came down in buckets. And, naturally, the wind blew. While it was no longer colder than a witch’s tit, it was too damned cold to sit upon the porch. Too cold to sit upon the porch. Too cold for the iced tea, too cold for the salty tater chips. It was even too cold for the squirrels. And it was way too cold for the lovely young women, with their pleasant smiles and short-shorts.

         The writer was stuck in his dinky little apartment, its dull white paint chipping from the walls. Two tiny windows allowed him to occasionally glance outside. Infrequently, he even enjoyed the companionship of bed bugs and fleas.

Oh well. Perhaps it was just as well that the writer wasn’t permitted to sit upon the porch with his iced tea or salty tater chips or squirrels or lovely young ladies in short-shorts. Although the apartment was dinky and ugly and claustrophobic as hell, it did allow the writer to wander around, wearing nothing but an open bathrobe as he revealed his shortcomings to bed bugs and fleas.

The writer spent much of the morning listening to Seventies and Eighties rock, while struggling to place so much as one word upon the blank computer screen. But now it was past noon, and still nothing had graced a planned document… for the exception of dust. The writer’s frustration neared batshit levels. Self-defeat, misery, and an overwhelming fear and dread of giving up his life’s dream of penning best-selling novels had won the day. The writer had been up since five-thirty in the morning. Not once did he dress more elaborately than the open bathrobe he slipped on. While the writer never minded his nudity (the bed bugs and fleas never once complained or protested), he had an unbearable appetite for a cheese burger at his favorite Asian cuisine.

While the writer wished to remain in his open bathrobe, even as he strolled to a restaurant just five blocks away, the local police might have a difference of opinion on the matter.

Tiredly, the writer put on a sweatshirt, two worn-out sneakers, and faded jeans. He turned off the power on his laptop computer and retrieved an Electric Light Orchestra CD from the stereo. After slipping on a thin windbreaker, the writer turned off the light in his dinky apartment, stepped outside, and locked the door behind him. He went to forget his frustration and sorrows while chowing down a cheeseburger at the nearby Asian cuisine. He hadn’t accomplished a damned thing, as far as his writing was concerned. The same went for the day before. Secretly, the writer wondered and worried that his attempt at a writing career was just that…. An attempt and nothing more. At the moment, hunger overwhelmed self-doubts concerning his future as a successful novelist.

As he walked through town on a cold, rainy, and blustery day, the writer buttoned his windbreaker and mumbled these few words to himself:

         TOMORROW IS ANOTHER DAY.