Brain... so... tired... need... to... write

I often feel guilty about neglecting my writing, and I have neglected it more than ever during this past month and a half. You may have noticed my absence from the interweb, though that is only a small sliver of my writing life. Sometimes my stretches of greatest blog silence are actually times of packed notebooks and furious scribbling. I have realized I prefer to write by hand than typing. I enjoy typing, but my brain works differently when I type. Of course, as you have probably figured out, my brain hasn't been working creatively for a while. It has been too tired. I am still tired. In fact, right now I am forcing myself to write this post. I have to and I need to, but it doesn't mean that it is hard. Most non-writer types probably don't get this, but for you literate jocks out there, think about it like doing exercise. The daily grind makes you tired, exhausts your strength, and at the end of the day all you want to do is to sit on the couch and prop up your feet. But while that is nice for a bit, it ends up being counterproductive and your body tires more than it mends. So you force yourself to go to the gym, even though you know that it is the last thing you want to do and though each exercise feels twice as painful as usual. You force yourself to do it, but it kind of feels good, almost better than when you are in shape. That is what writing is like for me right now.

Teaching is about the most mentally exhausting thing I have ever done. An introvert surrounded by people... often, really annoying people. A salesman trying to sell a product that the room full of clients doesn't want. An entertainer for a theater full of hecklers. A warden in a mental asylum. You get the picture. Not only is it mentally and emotionally exhausting, but it is creatively exhausting. People don't realize how much creative energy teaching requires, especially for younger audiences because you are constantly trying to find new ways to present information, new analogies and similes and ways to connect with your students, new ways to keep their attention. This constant imperative of novelty demands a huge stream of creative energy. So, like the exhausted athlete, I also just want to go home and sit on my sofa forever.

Sofa-ing was what I needed for a while, but I was getting to the point of muscle atrophy and so I am here forcing myself to write again. Meta-writing is something I enjoy, reflecting on the writing process, though I don't know if it is all that interesting you my (only) reader, so I will try to give you something a bit more engaging next time. Fortunately, I have just come back from a wonderful vacation that has re-energized my brain a bit. I have had some very cool experiences which I will write about soon. Fun stuff, but for today I just needed come into the gym and exercise.