Taken from an email sent this morning…

Sometimes, try as you might, what you want to write doesn't quite coalesce on the page in the way that you'd like, and you find yourself grasping at straws. Sometimes you find yourself trying desperately to stay on-topic, when the lure of an off-topic, but appealing, conversation, keeps drawing your metaphorical eyes back in its direction.

It always seems to end like this; a time full of solitude ending with a drive to Atlanta, resulting in a Sunday-morning urge to write before the wakening of the house disturbs the morning quiet. Not a bad thing, really, for someone who has been suffering from something that, from the correct angle, holds a distinct resemblance of writer's block.

Jane. Right out, along with Heathcliff. Visions of cinched corsets and unrequited longing.
Maria. Those blasted Von Trapp children. Definitely out.
Owen. Hey, wasn't he that short guy who spoke in CAPITAL LETTERS ALL THE TIME? Ugh, not going there.
Roxanne. She may not have to turn on the red light, but who wants to write about a character which comes with a pre-made soundtrack?

"The books we love do ruthlessly disclose something about us, as do the books we do not. And despite everything above, I am not certain I want to know what exactly my inability to read some great writers says about me."
- Tom Bissell, 'I'd prefer not to,' an essay published for Salon.com

I honestly thought I was the only one.I found the list of what someone, somewhere, decided was the 'hundred greatest books of the twentieth century' and, like the dutiful child I am, set out to 'better myself.'

Enough of those odd little musings. Tonight's storms have done their damage and moved on, and we had nothing this time except a lot of wind and more rain. Even skittish Edmund slept through it, so it definitely was one of the weaker storms we've had this week.

I've been toying with the idea of giving myself a bit of a mini-vacation from posting here for a few days. I know that won't happen, though; the best way to guarantee that something entry-worthy will happen tomorrow is for me to definitively announce tonight that I want to take a few days off. So consider this an officially wishy-washy statement of saying something like this:"I really want to take a day or two off from this, really I do, I swear, but I know that by saying anything to you that I've totally jinxed things."