Hand Writing

I went 'off the grid' for about a week, and it is a bit funny where I chose to do it - in Ottawa, Canada. I had made a pact with myself and a few close friends that I would not write on my websites during the time I was gone. Let's take stock - I went to a far more developed country than Trinidad and Tobago and went off the grid. Most people try to do the reverse, to come to the developing world citing tourism and going off the grid.

What can I say? I've never been accused of normality.

On the way, I saw Georgia Popplewell of Caribbean Free Radio on the plane to Houston, Texas. She said she would follow me on the blog, and I quipped as I passed, "No you won't...". She couldn't. She can't. You can't. It's all written down in a journal, by hand, with a few diagrams and doodles obtained for the price of coffee in Canada.

So, aside from not writing on websites, I put myself on a free writing exercise where I actually filled a 200 page journal by hand in 5 days. I allowed myself to take lots of pictures, but I did not post them until I was back in Trinidad. They are some good pictures if you want to check them out. I needed to break away from dealing with land ownership issues, family issues, and being pulled in a thousand directions by the forces of Life that sometimes seem to conspire against us.

Here's a hint: When you think Life is conspiring against you, its time to go off the grid.

And so I read, I wrote, I spent time with a person that I care for deeply. I ignored all the shenanigans and blog-fodder out there and got back to what I started with even before I knew I was starting it.

I wrote by hand. I wrote until my hand cramped. I regained familiarity with the pattern of poor handwriting toward the bottom of pages because of less purchase for the hand. I wrote, and I wrote more. It poured out. I had no idea so many things were stuck in my fingers, awaiting the vessel of ink to run through to gain purchase on paper. I wrote in coffee shops around unfamiliar people who seemed confounded that I was not reading a book but writing in one. I sat on park benches and wrote. I snuck into the Gazebo at the back of the Canadian Parliament and awaited sunsets with my fingers stiff from the cold, writing. I found that I preferred writing outside more than inside, so I wrote outside as much as my body would tolerate the harsh joke of Ottawa Spring.

And I wrote some more. My fingers went through three pens, and I stood outside myself much of the time and watched the process. My finger became sore, as sore as when I had the evil uncle of a Geography teacher scribbling blackboards full of notes before photocopying became price-competitive with chalk.

In between, I took pictures. My partner in -ship (a personal joke between her and I) fussed that I didn't eat off and on. So I ate.

Around the 3rd day, something strange happened. My hand stopped hurting. I had to write, even before my first cup of coffee I wrote paragraphs of all manner of things. I tried writing while walking, which one can do fairly well when you are in a place with sidewalks - but the world gets shut out then, and the last thing I wanted to do was to cut the world off. The world is full of things to write about, from the errant squirrel raiding the garbage bag to the wonderful bird that wasn't startled to see me.

Through all of this, I remembered how I started writing - not for publication, but writing. The old Trinpad copybooks in the drawer of the desk, lost through the callousness of my own soul as I traveled decades ago. And I remembered a conversation with Mad Anthony Wayne Waite who saw me at the crossroads between writing and Corporate America and told me that I couldn't do both, and that I should choose the path where my soul was. Well, how was I to know my soul wasn't down the path of 120 hour work weeks and a fluid bank account that served more as a waterfall than a still pond?

Writing. Yes, I remember now. And the paths to get to that remembrance are not regrets at all, they are simply... experiences that flavor my fingertips, that tint the ink, that make virgin pages blush.

Hand writing. Not for you. It's for me. It's a part of me that lay stagnant for so long that rabbits stared at their watches considering the official time of death instead of announcing their tardiness.

And it is so good to be back.

Thanks, -ship-mate. May the wind be always at your back and the stars always in your eyes.