Thinking Though Your Fingers

Since a very young age, writing has been my first choice for recording & communicating my memories & feelings. For a big part of my childhood, I felt as though I had no voice. I recorded things down in a dime store diary with, what I thought, was a very safe lock clasp closure. The diary was hidden between my mattress and the box springs -- where no one would think to look. The key to my diary was on the floor behind the foot of the bed -- where I could reach it when laying in bed at night. I filled the pages of one diary, purchased another diary, filled those pages, and a love of writing was born. 


I continued to write during the days of my youth... about depression, thoughts of suicide, my horrendous looking body, my experiences with boys (truthfully more about my LACK of experience), my dysfunctional family (whom I now look back on with respect & awe), being the unpopular girl, and more. Most of those pages were destroyed during my college drama days... in a fire place... since I didn't like what I read. It was too honest.

I "journaled" throughout my entire life. And, I wrote letters...

• to pen pals
• to friends I met at summer camps
• to my cousins who lived in other states & countries
• to high school friends when I moved out-of-state for college (I recently found a box of at least 50 letters I received in response to ones I had sent out)
• to the LOML when were were dating & separated by 1,000 miles
• to my parents when I was in college & as a young adult 
• to college roommates & friends after graduation

Some things haven't changed much in my life. And yet, many things have changed...

• daily fighting & winning the battle against depression
• no longer contemplating suicide
• being grateful that I have a body that works & not caring so much about its appearance
• spending life with a wonderful friend & spouse whom I affectionately refer to as the LOML
• creating my OWN dysfunction family with my favorite friend, the LOML
• embracing still not being the popular girl but making ripples in my own small pond

One thing that hasn't changed... I still love to write & record events, feelings, thoughts, fears, joys, challenges, victories, etc. I tagged a few #write31days friends in a photo yesterday on the stuckinindiana Facebook page. It's one of my favorites:

"Writing, to me, is simply thinking through my fingers." ~ Isaac Asimov

If I had to sum up this post with a suggestion for others... for YOU... I'd have to say:

Figure out HOW to find your voice... and embrace it!

And, I'm only free writing this post today because my friend, Karen Deschenes Courcy, suggested that we write something today & share it :)  How ironic that what I wrote today goes so perfectly with her Facebook cover photo!!

Some other great quotes about writing:

• “Writers fish for the right words like fishermen fish for, um, whatever those aquatic creatures with fins and gills are called.” ~ Jarod Kintz (shared here)
• "If you sit down at your desk and write one paragraph, you'll be amazed, either by how great that can be, or how you ended up writing more." ~ Anne Lamott (shared here)
• "Fill your paper with the breathings of your heart." ~ William Wordsworth (shared here)

Stop over at our Facebook page... When You're STUCKinindiana for more pairings, etc.