Artistic Commonality

So here’s something funny –

I’m sitting down to write my blog, something I haven’t done for (gasp!) for over six months, and the craziest thing happens – nothing is forthcoming.  Here’s why it shouldn’t be crazy: 

The same thing has been happening with my novel this last week and every night that passes me by with a negative balance in my creativity bank brings me closer to the brink of a breakdown.  So I should have figured the same would hold true with blogging, right?

Here’s why it is crazy:

My husband is a photography student at the Academy of Art in San Francisco.  A damn good one at that, probably the best in his class.  And when this exact same thing happened to him last week, I was surprised to say the least.  The look in his eyes, the tension on his face, it was all too familiar, only this time I wasn’t looking in a mirror.

So I told him what we writers always have to tell ourselves:  yes it’s work, yes it’s the hardest thing you’ll ever have to do, but it’s your passion.  It’s what you live for.   You have to work through it.  You don’t have a choice. Because to give up is unfathomable.  I handed him a guitar and told him to go make something happen.  That simple prop was all he needed, and he came back a winner.

I gave him the same advice that’s been given to me many times, and yet here I sat, unable to compose a single sentence.  How ironic.

And here’s the revelation:

We’re all the same, despite the differences.  Whether it’s the words on the pages, the lighting in the picture, the shading in the painting or the treble in your song, it all comes down to the same thing.  Artistic Commonality. 

I can’t tell my husband what picture to take when he has photographers block (not really sure if that’s even a word, but if it’s not, it should be), just like he can’t tell me what my story should be about when I have writer’s block.  We have to feel it ourselves, wait for it to hit us between the eyes, in order to work through it. But – we have to work through it.

Here’s to wishing someone would hand me a guitar.

Until next time,

Ciao!