Writer's Block Time!

There are a hundred ideas in my mind. I go to my laptop to vent out and feel lighter. Eyes on the screen, fingers on the keys, wait for it to strike. I scan through the many things I had thought of writing about at different times in the day. It feels like swimming in an ocean. Yet, when I come out of it I have no fish in hand, no one single idea to dwell upon. It’s like being lonely in a crowd; like being in a situation about which Taylor Coleridge said, ‘Water water everywhere nor any drop to drink’.

I think harder which makes things even worse for the harder I think, the more my thoughts get jumbled and more difficult the task becomes. The situation is quite similar to one in which one tries to remember a certain thing which is at the edge of one’s mind but the attempt at recalling pushes it away from the edge. So, knowing the causality, I try not to think and I focus on not thinking anything… don’t think… don’t think… don’t think. Something asks me what not to think and I start telling it all about the ocean of ideas thus defeating the whole purpose of not thinking.

Now, in an attempt to divert myself, I go downstairs sneakily, the time being three in the morning, and stand in front of the fridge hoping to engage in some foody delight. But the writing-ghost apparently is in love with haunting me. The bread reminds of how I could write about poor people starving and us apathetic, selfish people fulfilling our desires indefinitely, my cousin’s leftover bottle of Coke hints me to write on how stupidly we have fallen in love with these intestine-eating, calcium-draining, liver-and-kidney-destroying concoctions, the potatoes and tomatoes in the vegetable box remind me to write that list of dishes I had to compile for my mother which would help her decide what she could cook everyday, the cans of water call me to remind my couple of loyal blog readers to save fresh water reservoirs and just as my sight falls on the cookies there and before they could make me think of eating disorders, I slam the fridge’s door shut and turn to the T.V.

Flipping the channels doesn’t help either. The news channels make me want to rush a post in CAPITAL LETTERS about how they create hype about everything. Big bold letters say ‘News Alert’ making us expect something really important, and are followed by the same old mundane news of how I-don’t-even remember-what happened a minute ago. The music channels make me feel like pulling my hair out and hammering it all down on the keyboard that if one has the capability of analysing trends one might pretty much foresee porn being shown on these channels soon. Before the Indian channels could remind me of how we are totally forgetting all the reasons we call ourselves Muslims and Pakistanis for, I kill the machine and run back upstairs.

Since, my ultimate happy place is my laptop I come back to it like a faithful dog. With myself lying diagonally across the bed, my head resting on my unfolded blanket’s hill and my laptop on my thighs, I come back home to facebook but for some strange reason it doesn’t satisfy me. Yes, I then realize I won’t be at peace until I have fulfilled the writing-ghost’s desire of me writing something a little more mature than a facebook status. So, I here I am writing exactly what a poor writer goes through when going through a block, something that can happen to anyone anytime.