When I saw this bottle of whiskey on the shelf in ABC Liquors, more than a month ago, it gave me pause. I have read a lot about “writer’s block.” This assumes, of course, that writer’s block leads to Writers’ tears. I used to tell employees, “When people are paying you to write, there is no such thing as writer’s block.” You write. Many times, I just put words on paper or onto the screen to be revised.
But I continue to write.
But maybe that’s not the case. Maybe writers’ tears are about not getting published. Or maybe about the stuff the writer puts on the page. I’ve had that before, reliving the stuff of life and trying to read it to someone else. When I put it on the page, it’s just one thing. When I say the words aloud, I relive them. In front of other people.
It’s not about the reading or the sharing. It’s about reliving the moment.
At a writing workshop, I watched a woman deliver her poem. As it began, we were on a walk in the woods with her. She was birdwatching. A park in Jacksonville. Her binoculars hanging on her neck but listening for bird song. She hears something, brings up her glasses to scan the trees. She spies the bird but isn’t sure what species. Letting the glasses go she steps back onto the trail and she sees a man just six feet away. Then she describes a horrific rape and how she survived.
When it was over I asked her how she could read that without crying? “I don’t know,” she said, “I’ve been rewriting it for months, I guess I’m just used to it.”
I was tempted to buy the whiskey because I like Irish Whiskey, but I didn’t want to buy into the notion that writing and tears are inexorably connected.