Creative Constipation
It took only a week at home before the itch to head to Panama City Beach to steal some time alone on the ocean was stronger than my sense of duty. As I drove south I thought about all the jokes that had been spawned during our time in Costa Rica with our friends—the "less than tepid" water that dribbled from the showerhead at the center amused them rather than insulted them. I envied their great attitudes and I wished I could see "jungle life" as an adventure as they did. In defense of myself, I wondered if they wouldn't be thrown, too, if they dealt with the monotonous repetition of the back-and-forth.
About halfway through the drive to the beach, I fractured my finger, slamming it in the driver's side door as I reached to keep Sam from jumping out of the car—a reflex reaction I regretted the rest of the trek south because it throbbed like crazy. There was nothing to do but drive, as I had a schedule to keep because I was pulling new sliding glass doors for the condo on a trailer and I didn't want to be driving after dark.
I stopped in Troy, Alabama, to use the restroom and noticed the weather had grown incredibly breezy. As I drew closer to the beach, the wind seemed to increase with each mile, blowing wildly and buffeting the boxy Wagoneer each time it surged toward me. I peered through the broad windshield—my slide viewer that day and an outlet to the life taking place within the sparkling blue of the crisp winter sky. Relishing the fact that there was an advantage to sitting up high, I watched as birds were tossed about and hurled into clumsy formations. Awkwardly they flailed, coming close to collisions, their dramatic aerial ballet not unlike how my life had felt during the week since I'd returned from Central America. I'd barely had time to catch my breath—my days filled with a wedding shower, therapy, lunch with George Gabb and a stained glass class—an idea I'd hit upon so that I'd have a skill to contribute to the work in the mission field. It had occurred to me that I could build stained glass windows for the churches to keep myself occupied, and fortunately my skill for cutting and fusing glass was proving to be adequate.
I'd brought an envelope filled with mail to the beach, which I'd not had time to open. I hadn't even realized that a letter from Byline had been scattered amongst the missives I'd received. I held it to my chest for a while before I had the courage to open it—my heart beating wildly. Would they accept or decline my poem? I wondered, fear pulsing through my temples. I finally had the courage to rip the envelope open and the word "accepted" was all I could see. I stood on the deck watching two dolphins frolic—the sun sparking on their slick bodies as they surfaced—while I tried to take in the incredible news. I suddenly began to cry as I watched them plunge beneath the surface of the ocean and reemerge—rolling, sounding and surfacing as the sun turned their barreled bodies into smoky mirrors.
I practically floated back to Chattanooga after my two days of freedom, heartened by the fact that I could soon say I would be a published poet at last. As I walked Sam the next morning, I felt a renewed energy. Everything excited and enthralled me, even things I would normally have ignored, like the flock of black birds bathing in a puddle in our parking lot. They splashed and skittered, the water droplets dressing them for evening like ropes of brilliant diamonds flowing from their long black gowns. As Sam ambled along, sniffing this and that, I noticed how his hair was the color of winter grass and celebrated that he was such a precious companion in my life. As always, he resisted when I tried to drag him back inside so I could work on the draft of a poem. I let him sit with the breeze ruffling his long hair for a few minutes. Then, in our normal shorthand, he knew when my patience had run out. He lifted his behind rather haughtily and sashayed down the pea-gravel walkway into the courtyard in front of me. What a little pill he was when he grew snooty!
The nod by Byline had motivated me to hold my feet to the fire. I celebrated my achievement in my writer's notebook, declaring an end to my "creative constipation." That proclamation, like so many others, would turn out to be an empty one as the fuel I'd gained from my victory was short lived. I'd set myself a schedule to write every Tuesday morning. I thought that if I could stop torturing myself because I couldn't write every day, I'd have the energy I needed to write at least one morning each week. This routine held for a few weeks but life took over and all I managed most weeks were snippets of contemplation, many of them gleaned while I was ensconced at the beach—the only place I had enough downtime to write.
The waves are rough and frothy, and the spray lifts from each white crescent. I sit on the bed cross-legged, pillows propped behind me, as I record this dialogue with the wind.
The ocean rolls under a dull sky this day. Where clouds hang thicker, there seems to be puffy lines of deeper gray—a scowl maybe—to interrupt the endless dull monotony of cloud upon cloud upon cloud.
As the holidays rolled ever closer and I went through the motions of preparing for all of the festivities, a remarkable Christmas gift arrived. The Byline Magazine with my poem in it shone brightly as I tossed the mail on the kitchen counter one afternoon, the red cover glowing so strongly that I couldn't ignore it. My heart pounded as I reached for it and flipped though the pages. When the poem, with my name beneath the title, came into view, my vision dissolved as the tears filled my eyes. What a blessing I'd received! I thought as I hugged the thin publication to my chest.
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