Dear K
I’ve been in LA for five days, visiting my kids and my nephew’s family, completely disconnected from my normal reality. We ate great food, drove through Beverly Hills, walked along Venice Beach, played poker at a casino, went to The Getty, hung out in my nephew’s hot tub. I checked my e-mail 3 times, quickly. Now I’m back home, have been awake only a few hours this morning, and have been on the computer most of that time.
I have almost lost the ability to hand write, or to think about writing when I’m away from my computer. (And it has to be my computer, not someone else's) My brain connects writing with my computer. My brain connects work and self-importance to my computer. According to a fascinating book I’m reading for a review, Everyday Survival by Laurence Gonzales, our brain writes scripts (and we’re also born with pre-written scripts right in our DNA), and it takes a great deal of effort to rewrite or change these scripts, even if we understand that what we’re doing is not good for us. I moan and groan that the computer is ruining me, and yet. . . Here I am.
Here I will be.
3 comments:
I know what you mean - I can barely write with a pen or pencl anymore.
I can take quick notes, jot down images or line snippets to help me remember them later - but all my composing and rework is done via computer.
I think the ease of editing and the speed that I can get ideas down in is the difference. I can't write longhand as quickly as I type. (the scary part though, is I type four fingers.)
When my brother died, I lost about 50 percent of my handwriting ability. Most of it came back.
When dad died, I lost about 60 percent of what I still had. That was six years ago. Only about half of it has come back.
No matter how poor the quality of my hand-written notes are, however, the simple act of writing them somehow nails the content into my brain.
Hi Michael,
Thanks for visiting. Yeah, that's what I do too, mostly take notes, then go to the computer. And I type with only two fingers!
And Hi Erin,
Thanks, too, for checking in with me here. I'm with you. If I write it down, it stays with me, even if I lose the notes. So the key is always having pen and paper.
Peace all
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