Memoir Reflection
In my head in the now
Before I begin this I will be totally upfront with you, after today, my brain is totally fried and this won’t get the kind of depth prompts like this call for. In fact, I didn’t even realize this was part of tomorrow's homework until just now, being 10:40 pm the night before it's due. I spent till now making notes on the other things, that took longer than I thought, in order to read thoroughly enough to even make notes, so I kinda know already how this part is gonna play out, which is poorly.
In my head in the then
I grasp at straws, hoping the young impressionable writer I was trying to help would see them as being made of gold, spouting off the first of their flimsy finery to settle like dust on their ears and wait for them to sneeze with all the haze they left in the air and their minds. I didn’t get a sneeze but an eye-popping flicker to the internal bulb within them, glinting back a brightness I had only sparingly hoped for from my words hastily spewed to fill the space that was hooked on me like the question mark that briefly gave me a panic. It faded and all I could see was the ideas:
In my hope in their head in the then
It was simple. It was just obscure enough that I thought my teacher would buy it. I could work with this. The tooth fairy has OCD. It makes sense, I mean she did have very specific conditions that had to be followed if she was to endow, without stirring a wanting sleeper, a snaggletooth recipient, a consolation prize. The gap or gaps that would exist long enough to get them teased at, be unable to eat anything brought to the hungry mouth or say a single complete sentence without the words slipping through the vacancies like travelers unable to stay on track. You must be asleep first. It must be placed under your pillow. Should you move to much in your sleep and she was not able to find it then you would have to endure another day with all the negatives growing up while losing your teeth can bring, until you could at least feel the dollar in your pocket as well earned comfort. Yes, she was a picky one. She had to have it her way. Her way to pay. It was simple and I thought to myself of all the jagged, spitting angles the tooth fairy could still pay me, even though I had given all the baby chompers left I had to give long ago.
In my head in the then
I hoped the next raised hand would find such wisdom in my words, such meaning in my nonsense. I hoped I would have the answer even if I myself mistook it for something else. They asked me what I thought, as if my thoughts had some measure, some merit they could count on or in the least accuse. I swung around like a swing off axis but somehow not once swinging face first into a pole. I saw how some made great leaps from those pivotal points off the plastic board of safety and into the sand they hoped I provided. I pressed them forward but cautioned to not linger to long to make their point, saying how I myself often did, losing my nerve in the experience or finding an excuse why at times I can’t. They find comfort in my confession and so they become the teacher showing me how it's done, taking greater leaps as I sit back and watch them in awe. This playground is mine in this moment, mine to finally break away from the instructions and just go for it.
In my head in the now
The cursor taps and I look back to those young faces at the end of these lines. Tapping still, I muse there is much more to this than white space, more than Arial fonts and glowing screens; these are ideas, these are those flickers I saw behind those eyeballs, they are more than finger movements, they are continuous, endless mashing of minds, of moments, of subordinate clauses that have causes. They are both calculated and careless but yet captivating enough to concern me enough to keep going. This creative writing is more than its written form, it branches the mind to think creatively and like things that branch, it grows until one day we all hope it serves or reaches that point.
In our heads in the always
It scrambles words like eggs and boxes of jigsaw puzzle pieces, tossing them into the air, either landing to look as if professionally placed, plated with parsley and served with OJ, to help it down to digest, filling its reader or visibly sprawled in seeming madness in front of them on the page only when scrutinized enough does a picture become clear. We all cook and create it and in our own ways digest and decode it on a regular basis. It makes words interesting, the rearranging to make something new the careful placement to make something click. It shakes out ideas with gentle reminders like breezes whispering echoes of memories or slaps ideas into our psyche, rattling our walls, causing us to question our foundations. Without creativity in these, we may stand still, reciting lines like programs, learning only in repetition, if learning is what we want to call it. The way is to scramble ourselves well. Well enough to see a picture in the curs, connection in the curiosity of life and passion in the discovery. Place that pencil point down, tap those windows open, that tangy taste that washes it down is only the first tangent of many, let the words echo of you.
Back in my head back to you
You said start and finish in only 30 minutes. Now 11:21. Gave ya 41. This is the product of a tired mind but a product none the less and as a writer who must always seek out new ways to say the same things, can you really even ask for more? Of course, you can. The point is we put that a point back down yet again and again.
