13 June 2007

ideas, ideas, ideas.

Something that really sucked about how depressed I was without the meds is that my creativity was like a switch broken in the "off" position. All of a sudden, with the meds kicking in and working like gangbusters, I have ideas everywhere. Mostly ideas for blog posts, but even a few flashes of inspiration for the book, which has been stalled for a while.

Something I heard on NPR that made me think, oh, that would be a great blog post. Which isn't unusual, I often get inspiration from NPR, but this was something that I'm passionate about, a legal case that The Innocence Project was working on. Walking in to the gym, and another idea pops in my head. Driving the car, just ideas pouring out.

I'm actually NOT in front of the computer all the time, though, (believe it or not) and if I don't scribble down at least a sketch of the idea, it slips away. But my notes wouldn't be cohesive or anything but gibberish to anyone else but me. And not just because my handwriting is so terrible, either.

While on my way in to the gym the other day, I had to turn back around in the parking lot and go back to the car because I'd forgotten my iPod. Can't work out without music. Just. Can't. And when I stuffed the iPod in to the gym bag, I realized that I'd forgotten my little hand towel, that I use to mop off my face. I hate to sweat. Hate it. So I need that towel. I didn't get back in the car and drive back home to get it, not with gas at $3/gallon, thanks W!!!

But I did begin to giggle as I walked back through the parking lot, because I realized that I'd failed a crucial test of having my shit together as defined by Sci-Fi author Douglas Adams. Adams wrote The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, among many other hilarious titles. A person who has their shit together "Knows where his towel is," according to the Hitchhiker's guide, anyway. I'm fairly certain that I could quote verbatim the passage from the book about the towels, but since I'm not sure if that'd be copyright infringement or not, I'll refrain.

Another idea for a post came from watching cars when I was on the highway the other day, unless I've got music to groove to or NPR news to listen to, driving around in Oh-hi-ia is BOR-RING! So I watch other cars. I find it endlessly amusing that you can tell so much about a person from their car. What sparked this was I saw a guy about my age in a Volkswagen Jetta, probably a 2005 or newer, with a Dave Matthews Band sticker on the rear windshield, another small sticker that said "26.2," an Ohio State Alumnus license plate, and a bracket around the license plate with the name of a car dealer.

What do I know about this guy right away? He's a marathon runner, (26.2 miles in a marathon, y'see) a DMB fan, an Ohio State Alumnus and he likely lives now in the greater Cleveland metro area, where the car was purchased. He's doing all right for himself, because the car is newer and well taken care of. He's probably someone who keeps things, his house, his car, his office, fairly orderly. He's got an ego, because otherwise he wouldn't advertise the marathon running, but it isn't out of control because you have to be a runner to "know" that 26.2 miles makes up a marathon run. He probably belongs to some sort of running club or group, and group members may all have that sticker. He's pretty far out of his usual stomping grounds here, we're a hike from Cleveland and a haul from Columbus, so I know he was on a trip, and because of where he was heading, I know his destination wasn't in Ohio.

Scary, all that stuff that I already know about this guy just from looking at his car. If he wasn't so eager to advertise things on his car, I would have looked over at the average white guy and moved on to look at something else, instead of psychoanalyzing him.

But we're all guilty of wanting to put our own stamp on our belongings. The only thing on my car is a small static sticker of the American flag. I'm not a particularly patriotic girl, in fact the level of nationalism in this country often disgusts me, but I put it there a few days after 9/11 as a defiant act, and until it falls off or becomes a nuisance by rattling around in the car somewhere because it has fallen off, there it will stay mostly because I can't be bothered to crawl into the back seat and remove it.

All of this is interesting, but not really enough to make one post for each thing, at least not yet. The book idea was just a paragraph that I'm going to go back and put earlier in the story, but it is a small detail that will allow me to take the story forward, which is something that I've been having trouble with.

And this all scares me, I almost feel like I'm on a manic high, and worry that the meds are too much. I've stopped, mostly, the tremors, so that's not much of a worry anymore, but what if this sudden burst of ideas, creativity, the energy, goes away when I start tapering down the dosage as a precursor to getting off of them? Guess I should worry about that when I get there. Which won't be for a while, the last thing I want to do right now is stop taking them.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Scary, isn't it?

Lucy Arin said...

*nods vigorusly*

indeed.