Avoidance Behavior

There are some things we put off just because we really don't want to do them.  They are hard, or inconvenient, or boring, or all three.  Housework, other common chores, writing.  Well, writing isn't usually boring, but it is hard, and can be unpleasant when one doesn't feel there is anything to say.  Or perhaps there is a lot to say, and the saying of it is very difficult.
I often try to avoid housework, because after almost 29 years of keeping house, I am rather weary of it at times.  At other times, the housework is a way to avoid something else. Sometimes the housework is a necessary literal as well as figurative clearing of the decks so that other work can commence.  Dealing with the distracting details, like the dust bunnies in the hall, or the feeling that you would probably pretend not to be home if anyone came to the door simply because the state of your floors was embarrassing 
So, this evening, rather than try to come up with a decent blog post, I cleaned house.  I feel better now, because the environment I find myself in is more comfortable, and doesn't distract me with feelings of unmet obligations in the "real" world. 
Several times in my life I have retreated into books or movies as a way to avoid thinking about things I'd rather not deal with, or to distract myself from the fact that I was in a stale and stagnant place.  The alternate realities found in books and movies give a respite from what is currently bothering me.  I am sure that this is a normal condition among human creatures.  Needing an escape, if only for awhile.  There are movies I have watched over and over,  just because something in the story spoke to me, or amused me.  There are books and stories I have read and re-read for the same reason. 
Writing is not an escape for me.  I find I cannot write fiction.  It doesn't matter that I have always had a vivid imagination, and have lovely daydreams, I find I cannot put them on the page.  Poetry works, but poetry is about feelings, about dealing with joys and sorrows and sometimes humdrums of life, not usually about fantasy and escape.  Oh, I suppose it could be, but mine usually isn't. 
Now, I guess I should amend my claim that I cannot write fiction at all.  I have written some little stories about ghosts.  Those have been rather well received by the friends who have read them, but I have not let them out for critical comment.  They are my children, and I don't feel like watching them die.  They are not the sort of stories that would be popular with children these days.  They are old-fashioned, based very loosely on stories I was told as a child by neighbors and family members. 

A few of my poems have been published, but I was not paid for them, they were printed in a small local newspaper when I was in high school.  One was written for the high school year book supplement my senior year.  I have all of my notebooks where I worked on my poems still.  I still have about three journals going that are specifically for poem building.  Very rarely does anything come of it.  The best ones have sprung themselves on me almost fully formed. 
I remember the very first one I ever wrote for my personal "keeper" notebook.

Of Thoughts and rhymes and mystic verses
Loves and hates and evil curses
Life abounds in wondrous power
Opening up like a complex flower.

I wrote that in 1975 or so.  Fairly typical teenage stuff, at least for me.
The last one that really presented itself to me almost complete came to me during an organ concert at church.  We were sitting down in the chancel, which is not usual, and I could see the stained glass window in the first dormer on the Epistle side of the church, and that is the one that our regular homeless person used to look up at and talk to before and after church.  Looking up at the angel, I wondered what Adam said to it, and what he heard in response.  "Adam's Angel" came to me then, almost complete.  I had to wait until I got out of the church to write it down, and I remember being afraid I would forget something important.  I don't think I did:


Adam's Angel
(A meditation during the organ recital, Nov. 17, 1998)
By Carolyn Kay Armistead

To the rest of us
She is nothing but colored glass
An adornment
But she speaks to Adam;
Or maybe only he will hear her.

Adam isn't always clean
In his Army coat of scruffy green
But he is always serene
As he goes on his way
Beaming.
Doing the Angel's bidding.

"He talks to himself."
One will say.
"He's insane."
Says another.
I don't care.
He talks to angels
And the church wouldn't feel right
Without Adam
Besides,
Isn't he our brother?

Adam, in the old coat,
Who talks to stained glass angels,
And sees a truth we don't.

 This one is in my notes on my Facebook page, and I shared it after I wrote it with a few people at church. 
All of this is to say that sometimes I have to make myself write, and sometimes the writing makes me write.  Sometimes the words just want out, and I can't stop them. 
Most of the time, though, it is a slog.  A lot of staring at the paper or the screen and wondering what ever made me think I had anything worthwhile to say to the world.    It still feels a little egotistical, writing all this and sharing it with the world on my blog, but I need to do it.  I need the discipline.  And, if something I manage to put out there actually strikes a chord with someone who happens upon this blog, and it helps them or makes them laugh, or cheers them, or gives encouragement, then it's worth it.  Even if it just lets them say, "So, I'm not the only one..."