To write is to write is to write is to…

I write best braless, in silence and solitude. Otherwise, I put up a show of writing, of thinking, of being busy. The constricting band around my ribcage reminds me that I am not alone; that I am in company and visible. In cafes, words compete with music, color and form for attention. The laughter and presence of people draw me out into company. At a table by myself, a part of me remains tethered to community; listening and processing; experiencing. The product is derivative and tepid — nothing to be proud of. Or, I’m left with friction and an empty page; the sense of straining to get past a busy mind into my quiet self — to the place where my own voice lives, and from where my most inspired thoughts come.

When I settle into myself, without constraints or interaction, I become unaware of my body or the space around me. I am all in myself, in a place where only words, memory, feeling and imagery speak. With time, I get drawn back into awareness by a full bladder, a hunger headache, or the restlessness of having sat too long. It helps if that time comes with the depletion of having written well. If I am unlucky, a person with a question, a knock at the door, or the insistent ring from the phone, will tug at me before I’m ready. I become annoyed; my irritation like a child out at play who is called to go home. “What?” comes from me in those moments, carrying the weight of an implied “leave me alone”.

According to Gertrude Stein, ‘To write is to write is to write is to write is to write is to write is to write is to write’. Or in simpler terms — one learns to write by writing a lot. Virginia Woolf wrote ‘A woman must have money and a room of her own if she’s to write fiction’. When I first read this, it struck recognition and agreement within me. Without quiet space for thought and the working of words into order, how does one write? Without money, how does a woman afford solitude?