(From Websters: Opprobrium- A. 'Public disgrace or ill fame that follows from conduct considered grossly wrong or vicious'. B. 'Contempt, reproach')
I sat at the feet of the master, a great writer who could use such a word in a sentence. I asked him "How do you do it?
Awaiting his sage advice, ‘sage’ being another word I'd heard him use recently in reference to wise beings- or was it the other way around, he using it to diss' wannabe sages?-, he looked skyward for a moment, then off to his left, then on a downward slant from there. He was 'in his process', and I studied his moves for clues.
"I don't know" he replied, after some bit of pause.
"You don't know?!" I rejoined him. "How, then, can I learn?"
"You must go there” he said, looking up to his left again and pointing skyward with a bony index finger, sure to have been turned that way over decades of scribing.
“Where?”
"There, into that realm where thoughts appear and assemble themselves"
"I’m not following this. You are pointing into empty space"
"Yes. Have a problem with that?"
"Uh, Yeah. Aren't there actual steps that writers use, outlines and plots and uh, whaddya call them....."
"Storyboards?"
"Yeah! Storyboards! The whole thing is thought out, worked out, beforehand. Honed and crafted in intimate detail. I've studied the processes of some writers. Didja know that the guy what wrote the 'Jeeves and Wooster' series laid out the plots of whole books on meticulously written notes that he posted along the walls of his study?"
“That wrote Jeeves and Wooster".
The master offered a correction to my attempt at style, which I nodded to, before continuing.
"And that Agatha Christie put her murder mystery stories together by knowing how the books ended first? It seems that the best writers think it all out before they even sit down at the typewriter. Is that how you do it?"
He’s asking me to take the red pill!
Markus Spike- Unsplash.com
I thought it hardly my place to question the master's process but my eagerness came from hoping he would shed some light on it. To this end I simply found myself unable to restrain myself. He turned his kindly gaze away from me and stared up and to the left, into space again. Seemed he was searching for something.
"I follow no such process as you have described. I put the book, the article, the short story, the piece, the poem, together in my mind. Then I sit down to type"
"How can that be? How can that be so?" queried I in desperation. I searched the master's eye's for hints of jest but found none. "It seems highly improbable, not to mention impudent, to rely solely on memory, prodigious as yours may be, to offer up words that way!"
"Who said I memorize them? There is no need for that"
"But... ...where.... uh.... ...whu... ...how are the words stored? And in which way do you retrieve them? I.... "
"Can't go there? If that's what you're thinking, and I'm sure it is, you are correct in your assumptions. It makes no logical sense"
"Are you channelling?”.
I had to ask this question, for it seemed to be the only other thing that could be happening. The words must be coming from another, in another realm.
"I don't know"
"There you go again!" I cried in dismay. "I can't help saying that for you are being no help to me at all!"
"That is your lesson for today then!" said the master. “Writing makes absolutely no sense. How the words are formed, where they are stored, all of it. There is no 'container' called 'the mind' that anybody can find or see or study. But then, it is like everything else we do, in that what we do lacks a container from which it springs! Speech- where does that come from? Sight? Smell? Touch? We take these abilities for granted yet are unable to pinpoint their sources. Science will say (haughty and somber tone of voice) "Neuro-receptors and synapses and such are the places where thought and all the rest takes place" and from a scientific point of view that may very well be but it's kinda dry, don't you think? Takes all the mystery out of it, as if we were machines that run on parts and if you take enough of a machine apart you can back-engineer it to figure out how it works. Well, if that was so they would have been onto something but (looking around) I don't see any robots with highly developed human qualities yet"
"You don't read much?" I offered up, again hoping not to offend. "There's A.I...."
"Yes of course I read" he retorted, but kindly (THANK you). "Where do you think I get all those big words from? I see other writers using them and cop their stuff"
"No!"
"Yes! Everybody plagiarizes. It can't be stopped. I steal your stuff, you steal mine, we circulate ideas and concepts and slang words- especially slang- in that way. Now where were we?"
"Your process. How it's done. I need specific guidance. A book. A course. A writers group. Feedback. Mentoring. Will you be my mentor?"
"I certainly will not! Mentoring is the worst thing for somebody like you! You'll spend a lot of time trying to write like your heros, in their style, and then years down the road you will find your own voice. Happens to most writers. I can offer you a shortcut, if there's any wisdom at all that I can impart. Just write! Find your own way! Express what's in your soul begging to come out. It's there. If it wasn't, you'd be wanting to do something else, like learning how to play the tuba! When something calls to you, where do you think that comes from?"
"I don't know"
“Nobody knows why they do what they do. All they know is that they can't help doing it! Simple! Life is simple!”
"Well, when you put it that way.... ...I can see how it makes sense"
"People weren't meant to ponder their futures forever, or for like what seems to be forever. Life used to be too short for that. But now they have all this free time and a buncha choices and they get locked up in indecision. 'Just Do It'. Now there was an ad campaign".
I left the master's abode shortly after our exchange and went out into the neighborhood, walking some to re-establish my energy, for his presence had been strong. "I know" the idea came to me out of the clear blue, "I'll write a thing called 'Thought Of The Day'"
Now you know.