The Thread

The first poem I ever wrote was called Boredom. I was thirteen, and I thought it best to write about something that was often on my mind. My conclusion at that time was that boredom was the “inability to do.” This wasn’t a half-bad observation for an adolescent, though it did beg the question of why I often felt able to do one hour and not the next. Such are the mysteries of life. As a poet, I could but reveal them. And anyway, I was just glad I’d written the thing, that an idea had come along and I’d followed it to a reasonably satisfying conclusion.

My choice of subject matter then was rather prescient. Boredom would become a lifelong problem – and by problem I mean a reoccurring unpleasant experience for which I believed there was only an intermittently available remedy. That remedy was something fun or interesting to do; absent that, I was bored, and life became a dull and disappointing routine. It was like a curtain had fallen across my mind, and I could see nothing of value beyond it.

Fortunately, my daily writing practice provided a glimpse behind that curtain. Sometimes when you’re writing a story it’s going along just fine and you’re following its path, laying down one satisfying sentence after another. Then you come to the end of sentence, and the path is no longer clear. You’ve lost track of the story’s thread, what will hold it together from beginning to end. You could just keep writing, but it’s not such a good idea. Without that through-line, nothing you write will have the natural, interesting energy that propels a story.

Better to wait, to still your mind until you find that thread again. After all, you don’t want to write anything, to just type. The action of putting words on the page is merely the very last step in a process that takes place almost entirely within the formless interior of the imagination. No action I take, whether clacking on a keyboard or strumming a guitar or going for a walk, will be interesting and satisfying unless it is an expression of that thread that runs through all my stories and my days.  

If you like the ideas and perspectives expressed here, feel free to contact me about individual coaching and group workshops.

Everyone Has What It Takes: A Writer’s Guide to the End of Self-Doubt
You can find William at: williamkenower.com