befriending the muse

a new form of procrastination

I am writing today from my apartment in Brooklyn. Outside my living room window are city noises and ginkgo trees. I’ve lived here for over a month now—a layer of dust has gathered on the full length mirror in my bedroom and I can no longer pretend unpacking is a necessary task that requires my attention. It’s October, friends, and I promised myself I would do one thing this fall: Write.

In August, I attended a 10 day writing conference in rural Vermont. The best advice I gleaned among the crickets and yellow farmhouses came not from the famous writers there to impart wisdom upon us bright-eyed and bushy-tailed ones, but from my friend Nathan. He gave me the unsolicited advice to never again think of my discretionary time as Free Time. No, he said, you will not have any free time in New York. You will have Writing Time.

I am halfway through Stephen King’s memoir (On Writing), and, I know I’m late to the game, but I have no more questions as to why so many have, for decades, declared the man a genius. He says Hard Work and the ability to produce 2,000 words a day (not impossible but, of course, requires diligence) is pretty much all it takes. Steering clear of television and adverbs is also advised, but this we already knew.

What is Hard Work? Churning out those 2,000 words daily? Doing so even in the face of despair and, I don’t know, unpacking? An all-knowing muse? Self-fucking-discipline!?

Stephen King says there is a muse. His lives in the basement, taking the form of a man who sits among dusty boxes and smokes cigars. The Hard Work is getting this guy to put down his cigar and share some of the magic fairy dust (inspiration) he keeps deep in the pockets of his worn corduroys. He will share the magic dust, but not before Steve proves himself a worthy vessel.

I imagine going down to the basement, moving a few boxes out of the way, and buttering him up with the vintage humidor I thrifted with him in mind.

The hard work of writing is not the act of typing words on a page. The hard work is grasping at something invisible, a malleable entity that is therefore capable of coming and going on its own.

My muse does not live in the ground. According to my roommates, there is an ancient drain in our basement that was the source of a cockroach problem two years back, and the last thing I want swarming the gateway to my inspiration is cockroaches. Even though my muse is more of an up in the clouds kind of guy, he doesn’t take any shit, which might be the common denominator between all muses.

Today my muse is like the negative space in a photograph. What can be found at the edges of the focal point and beyond it? If I believe the air around my desk has the capacity to sparkle with unseen inspiration, it then becomes a matter of holding still, listening. And leaving my phone on the other side of a closed door because god knows my muse will test me with demands to see my TikTok algorithm.

My mantra for October thus far: coax the muse with kindness & read your books.

-Isabel