Musings on Muses

Happy Sunday / Monday kids!  I hope everyone is having an outstanding weekend.

Before I get to the topic for today's post, I'd like to pose a quick question to the universe: I wonder if the mega-successful writers of the world, you know the Pattersons, Sparks, Kings, James' and the like, have issues with temperamental weed-eaters?  For some reason I think it would do my heart good to know that somewhere out there Stephen King is ready to go all Misery on an uncooperative string trimmer at some point.  You know, just go straight up sledge hammer and wood block on it. I know, I know.  Deep breaths and happy thoughts...

Moving on...

Last July I posted a somewhat limited discussion of the topic of muses.  While I don't necessarily care for retreading already stomped ground, I did receive an email this week that brought my mind back around to the topic.  The email posed a basic question: are muses worth it with all the drama they inevitably cause?

Well, let me adjust my chair, crack all my fingers obnoxiously, and wade right on in to this one.

The answer, in a word, is ABSO-FUCKING-LUTELY!

The lady who wrote this email is a friend who is just getting out of an overtly intense relationship with a man who, to hear her tell it, had the ability to ring brilliance from her with each orgasm. While she may have a flair for the overdramatic, her point was that since the end of that relationship she has a fair amount of difficulty putting words to paper. This has left her wondering if the whole mess was worthwhile.

For those of you that have followed the blog for a while, you know that I've complained a lot over the course of the last year or so about having difficulty with my third novel, Hurricane Carolina.  In a nutshell, I had a good story at the center of the novel but wasn't able to make it "work" as it were.  The book felt like a candy bar without the chocolate shell, essentially all fluffy nougat with nothing holding it together. I initially blamed it on the fact that nothing was really inspiring me at the time.  Over time, however, I had to go back to the well like any good hack and start drawing on personal experiences to try to find something to use as the "glue" for my story. What I found was not only a good idea but also a little bit of personal insight.

People come in and out of our lives all the time. Sometimes these relationships are merely trivial acquaintances but sometimes they have dramatic impacts on us.  Occasionally, at least in my humble opinion, a relationship between two people can become so impacting that it actually changes both of them to the core of their beings.  It's my opinion that these relationships are the ones that scribblers like myself draw upon for inspiration both during and after their time with that other person in their lives.  For my friend, her trouble is now found in the absence of that relationship that provided her such marvelous insight.  My advice to her would be to mourn the loss but not focus on its absence. Use the memory of that passion to continue your own inspiration.

My own issue with inspiration from the "lack" of a muse came about after realizing that the impact of the last person who really inspired me was fading.  That person's influence and impact wasn't really felt in my life anymore.  We'd moved on with life like everyone does.  It happens. The problem was that this rich and fertile ground that I'd been able to harvest ideas from was no longer being nourished, so to speak, and was starting to go fallow.  And that's when the idea hit me...

I was able to take that loss of inspiration and turn it into a frame for my story.  Instead of just a simple damaged boy meets damaged girl tale, I was able to turn it into a story of what happens when a person gains and then loses a relationship that affects them so deeply that it takes years after it ends for its impact to fade and what the repercussions are from that fading.  Hey, what can I say, sometimes when you live it you have to find a way to make it work for you.

Are muses worthwhile.  Definitely.  Do you need one as a writer... well hey, even fictional ones need a little help every now and again.  Need an example?  Paging Hank Moody...

Have a great Monday boys and girls.  Talk to you in a bit!