In this world of word processors and email, I have come to notice how neglected a thing a pencil has become. I, myself, have been guilty of ‘processing’ my words. The passive ease of typing and spell checking, although attractive, I think, has taken from me some of the freedom and power in my words.
Given the opportunity to, once again, wield a pencil, I find myself struck by a sense of satisfaction found, reborn, in watching the page filled by my movements. The words themselves, although sounding the same in my head as I write them, somehow feel more important as I see them written in my own script. The act of erasing is so violent actually scrubbing, and wiping away the proof of my own thoughts, leads me to exercise more caution in the words I choose.
The intense compulsion toward all things expressive makes as benign a thing as reading in a coffee shop something tantamount to public masturbation. When a phrase is enticing, my mouth moves, tasting the words, a perfect paragraph will cause me to read aloud, to call out, to share, not at all unlike the moans and cries pulled from my lips in the depths of pleasure.
The ideas brought to life in my mind by an artist’s beautiful words fill me with a perverse sort of glee. A Catholic’s first communion is wrought with an intense sense of awe for this holy act and with a selfish pride in being allowed to taste the wine. It is the same, in this, for me.
Although I know a word written is a word shared, and that I am most likely a part of an audience, a multitude of readers, being allowed to taste the joy and pain placed before me by the writer feels so very intimate, so real each time, like a tryst. Causing stolen whimpers in shadowed corners…
My writing this, your reading it, I’ve opened a door, you’ve crossed a threshold. A commitment to each other in each letter. What I’ve shared, what you’ve learned – we are no different than lovers, now.
So I light a cigarette, inhale deeply, and ask,” Was it good for you, too?”
