Creative People: Please please please hang in there. Find your island (again and again and again!)
I am listening to a group of young men doing math homework. One guy seems to get it. The other guys are at varying levels of understanding.
I feel this tonight, even though I sit alone, surrounded by the bland art of a corporate coffee establishment, by myself. My phone is charging next to me, my computer screen waiting for something of interest to be thrown down in rows of some sort of intelligible configuration of letters.
I am sitting at a virtual table, suspended somewhere midair, miduniverse, mid-river flowing while I float on a raft wishing I could find an island to sit on and dock, alone with these words of mine not those words of theres.
A bunch of people I love and adore peppering me with questions and I don't have the answers for any of them. All I want to do is write. I want them all to stop asking me questions and just let me do what I need to do: write. Express. Make meaning from life experience and put it on a screen and hopefully help others to find meaning, too.
I am reminded I can't forget I am an artist. Sometimes that requires reminding those around me I am an artist. If I don't dock on that island with regularity, things - and I - may get ugly.
It was as if in a moment my fairy god mother arrived.
My phone went dead mid sentence and the peppering of questions stopped.
I took a breath and dove in to my sea of words. These are the ones that came out.
Nothing particularly mind-shattering yet exactly what I needed, like the iced tea-lemonade beside me. It is a corporate, not-too-tasty-yet-not-offensive blend.
The boys working on their math assignment have left. They were chatting about rugby, drinking and the use of protein to bulk up as they left. "But I don't drink anymore," was the most memorable of the words spoken.
A young woman just rushed in, headed straight for the restroom.
Another nerdy boy-man is here, about to study his Bible and plug in his ear buds.
I notice they've changed the furniture here. No longer any comfy chairs, instead replaced by college dorm modern. The girl who rushed for the restroom scurries out as quickly as she arrived.
Clarity arrives on the road of jazz vocals and a man with a plaid shirt and a barrista calling out "Roberto" and putting a straw on the counter next to what I think may be green tea.
I'm going to save and continue. What about you?
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Julie Jordan Scott is a writer, creative life coach, speaker, performance poet, Mommy and mixed-media artist whose Writing Camps and Writing Playgrounds permanently transform people's creative lives. Watch for the announcement of new programs coming Spring, 2014 and beyond.
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