I’m not referring to what happens when you’re reading a really good book and feel like you’ve fallen through the pages into another world. That’s a magical experience, but I’m talking about its exact opposite.
It happens to me all the time; and frankly, sometimes it’s the only thing that can jar me out of that terrible suspicion that I’m not really a writer.
The most recent time it happened, I was shivering in front of a bonfire at an outdoor Christmas party, drinking beer from a Solo cup and studying the total strangers around me. I felt strange and content (and stone cold sober, if you’re wondering). I realized I needed to commit everything I saw, heard, felt, smelled, and tasted to memory in explicit detail, because this had to be part of a story. Nothing was really going on, but it felt like the beginning of something.
It usually happens outside. With very few exceptions, it happens during an entirely novel experience.
It’s at least the fourth best experience in the world–in my world, anyway. It’s a great reminder that getting out of my safe little bubble and experiencing weird shit is absolutely mandatory for the writer in me to survive.
– AK