Why I Can't Write and Writing About It

She sat in front of the computer; or, rather, the computer sat on her lap. The advancement of technology welcomed the spawn of computers the size of notebooks a few years ago but that certainly did not pose as a remedy to writer’s block.

With the welter of events that etched themselves into her timeline, she simply could not organize her thoughts into something interesting and relatable. She had a lot to say but didn’t know what exactly. Should she talk about her lab teacher or should she define line spectra? Maybe she could write about the fish ball stand near the College Union Building.

In a span of three months she had accumulated a number of things she learned to love and hate. She loved the trees that line up the road near the football field and the way the sun shone through the gaps and leaves at sunset. She loved the smell of dew in the morning, however cliché that might have been. She loved the lectures her Asian studies professor gave. Then again, she hated the mornings—foggy and conducive to sleepiness—as well as her 7 am classes, what with them being a hindrance to rest and recovery from late night trauma. She hated how everything was happening too slowly.

A bag of chips lay at her side, crumbs claiming territory on the cotton sheets of her bed. She would clean that up later and make sure no ants climb up to eat her up skin cell by skin cell that night. The priority was writing something—something, anything that would make sense and be considered an actual write-up or musings of religion and social norms. One word was all it took to start a phrase, then that phrase would become a sentence, and sentences would turn into a paragraph. One topic, one main idea: perhaps a recent experience, maybe even an opinionated criticism of cats. She sat and thought, stretched and waited.

Ten minutes walked by but nothing came to mind. Her bag of chips was empty. She would have to clean that up too.

There. Currently the story of my life. I really couldn't care less about sentence fragments right now. College is eating my life (not that I had one in the first place. Oh, snap.) and my underdeveloped body fats along with it ( which is a good thing, actually, because I think I can qualify for Vogue now that my collar bones are sticking out and all.)

I'll have four hours of Math tomorrow. I don't think I'll get out of the classroom with my brain still intact.