Wordlessness

It's strange to write a blog about not being able to write, but that's what seems natural right now.

I usually don't have a problem with words; those of you who know me understand that I usually have something to say about almost anything (hence the whole idea behind blogging in the first place).  I'm not sure if that's versatility or tedium.  I try to keep it to the former, but no guarantees.  Lately things have been such that I feel robbed of the compulsion to write.  I've made attempts at two or three different blogs of varying subjects, with zero success.  The words are stilted and choppy, like puzzle pieces that look like they fit together but really belong elsewhere in the big picture.  I'm not sure if it's my inability to see the big picture that is preventing me from fitting the pieces in properly.  Huh.  That's an idea.

As for emotions, I feel as if I've been sealed shut, or shrink-wrapped.  I have occasionally experienced an inability to feel things, and it's usually so pervasive that I am unable to feel lousy about it.  I just know I should, because feeling things is a deep part of who I am, and I'm usually able to tell what I'm feeling at any given moment in time.  Not being able to feel something - anything, positive or negative - is Not Me.  The first time I remember having this inability to feel things (in my adult life, anyway) it scared me to death, deep down.  I remember feeling as if I were in a straitjacket with a gag, or in an iron isolation room that was too small to let me move or sit down.  Feeling panicked about not being able to feel sounds like a contradiction, but there you have it.  I was so glad when it was over, because it was frustrating to be there. 

So, it's happened again.  In one way I feel the same sense of frustration; although I am pretty sure the "non-feeling" will pass, it stinks while it's here, and I feel bound.  But in another way it feels as if I'm waiting.  I don't know what for; I'm just waiting.  I've had this sensation as well; it feels as if I'm being held down for my own protection, like a soldier holding down a civilian to protect her from sniper fire through the window.  It's an odd thing. 

In the book The Magician's Nephew, the children Digory and Polly end up by magic in a place they call "the wood between the worlds."  It is a sleepy, peaceful place, full of trees and pools of water.  There are no insects or birds or wind, and the sunlight is dimmed by the branches of the trees. Says Digory later, "It's not the sort of place where things happen.  The trees go on growing, that's all."
 
Maybe I'm in the wood between the worlds. 

wb