Missed destiny

You must write. Become a writer!

I am regularly haunted by those urgent words spoken by that quiet old gentleman whose business was palmistry.

NaNoWriMo draws to a close, and I am wistful.
I admire all who entered, whether they completed the exercise or not.

It was 30 years ago, when that gentleman was in the last years of his life and retired from giving palm readings to concentrate on completing his book – a great tome on the science of handanalysis. I don’t know what strings my boyfriend tweaked to obtain our private session. The careful procedure of inked hands and exquisite detailed prints was so very different from the atmosphere of crystal balls I had half expected to encounter.

I always wonder if despite his professional rather than psychic approach he could in fact forsee the time when I would suddenly be unable to write. His analysis of my character had, after all, been uncannily accurate.

So what did I do for 30 years?
I had endless ideas, plots and worlds in my head. They are still there, lurking in deep burrows like miffed animals that scowl at me on odd occasions.

I took my trusty portable typewriter around Australia for 36,000 km, and gained extraordinary experiences of value for my novels. Life lived intensely for seven months left me with only a scattering of pages of what happened on quieter days, and scarcely decipherable notes dashed off in retrospect for the busy days. For all subsequent travel I just took a camera.

During a decade of work I had good intentions.
Steering a 7 year relationship to marriage swallowed those. Baby raising years were devoted to raising babies. I never dreamed all my stories could become trapped.

A bit of demyelination. That is how the neurologist phrased it.
Numb toes. MS.
I learned to live with being unable to feel hot water on my back, with paresthesias in arms and legs. The surprise was scrambled brain.

I wrote eloquent letters to my friends – in my mind. Any attempt to get them on paper failed. All thought vaporized as I picked up the pen or touched the keyboard, or even tried to dictate. Something awful had happened to my short term memory. I could not even write a shopping list.

I had sudden empathy for anyone with writer’s block.

Reading was still a pleasure. And dreaming up worlds.
Stories chased themselves around and around with nowhere to go.

It was email therapy that helped. A sympathetic friend. No requirement for correct sentences or punctuation. Surfing the net together and sharing our finds.
Then followed slowly laboured posts for the Hobb messageboards. Speculation on Farseer futures fuelled motivation to persevere.

But perhaps this is where I should be – in a blog.
Messageboards move fast. By the time I compose something to post, the thread has dropped off the page, or people have already answered brilliantly.

Robin Hobb’s advice to aspiring writers has always been to write, and keep on writing. “You will never have any more free time than you do right now.”

I would add: write like you might soon unexpectedly not be able to.