Imagine there are people who, when they are reading, that’s all they’re doing, just reading. I have friends who sit transfixed, as if transformed or transported to who knows where, comatose in front of their book. I tell my students if you’re going to be a writer, walk around with a hammer in your hand, wear a tool belt, carry a shovel or a flyswatter. To others, when they see us doing our most serious work, we look as if we’re doing nothing. The punishment is severe. They will hand us a shovel, or a scrub brush or a vacuum cleaner. At least, now that my pen’s active across the page, no one will bother me. I understand all of this, between the daydreamer and the poet. For me, once I wade into any strand of words, something inside me immediately starts speaking back. That’s when somebody else’s words spark my words. Somebody else’s story, sentence at a time, becomes huge openings for all of my stories. Memory has no chronology. Your line sparks my opening line, and, after all gets said and written, your book turns into my book. Imagine there are people who actually wait for another to stop talking before they speak.
Interesting point. Well said.