The Patience of the Blinking Cursor

The pain and gain of writing every day.

Some days it is more challenging to write than other days; today is an example of a difficult day. If I had an old Underwood on my desk, I would be surrounded by crumpled balls of paper. If I worked at a newspaper, my Editor would be screaming at me. If I was a famous novelist, my Publisher would be demanding the return of the advance on my book. I am none of those things.

blink. blink. blink.

I’m sitting here alone in my studio with the only pressure being that which I put on myself: To write every single day. I don’t have a deadline or a word count, just a small blinking cursor anxiously awaiting the next letter to appear. The cursor is both agonizingly patient and persistent. Once I load the page to write, it’s there waiting for me. Even after writing a particularly clever sentence or turn-of-phrase, there it sits, blinking as if to say, "Cool. What else ya got?"

blink. blink. blink.

One of the things I’ve noticed by writing every day is that one day 500 words can take two hours to get onto the page, and other days 1,500 words appear in under an hour. It's hard to say why this is the case. For example, today, every letter is taking its sweet time to show up—I doubt I’ll get to 500 words.

I’m equating this writing ritual to going to the gym. Not every day is going to feel great, and sometimes it takes a Herculean effort to do that one last rep, but at the end of the workout, the endorphins are swimming around, making life wonderful, and you’re grateful you forced yourself to get the workout done.

blink. blink. blink.

So this paragraph is my last rep. If I was an Old-Timey Newshound, I’d pour myself two fingers of bourbon, crush another cigarette into an overflowing ashtray, and roll a new page into the Underwood. But I’m not that. Instead, I’m going to reach into the dish on my desk, pull out a green Gummie Bear and pretend I’m Godzilla.