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Creative Nonfiction Contemporary Funny

TW: Writer’s block, and mild swearing (caused by the writer’s block).


“This is going to suck,” I involuntarily announce. Immediately, I wince at the discreet (and not-so-discreet) glares I get from the quiet patrons around me. Shit!


The northwest side of the library is congested with people. This section of the branch seems to be the quietest, or it is the ambience offered by its floor-to-ceiling windows, allowing the sun to luminate the room and warm up the cushioned community chairs and study desks, that make it feel more peaceful than the rest of the building. The view out the windows is mundane, nothing special; it is a crossroads, a trio of stop signs directing traffic on some busy surface streets in a small neighborhood. There are people walking along, cyclists zooming by, eucalyptus and oak trees swaying and failing to hold onto their leaves. 


Each moving piece with its own story, I lament, watching from a small study desk in the far corner. Everyone has a story but me, I groan internally.


Around me are chairs filled by seemingly concentrated people, and I can’t help but wonder what is plaguing their mind, wonder if it is at all the same for them as it is for me. 


The person in front of me is taking a child development quiz for school. I’m surprised, mostly because of his age, I suppose, but I am also intrigued. Me too, me too, I think, a part of me wanting to share my love for child development with him. Ask him what he’s taking, what school he’s studying at, or if he needs any help. By the looks of it, he got several of the answers wrong, and is reviewing the correct answers before utilizing his second attempt. 


The man across from me hasn’t moved; his headphones secure him to his laptop, which I presume is still playing that Youtube video I saw him watching when I walked past him earlier. There’s a young woman behind him, spending more time on her phone than working on her open computer. I saw her outside earlier gossiping and giggling with a friend, and I wonder if that is who is distracting her from the blank open Word document.


All of this is my massive distraction from the fact that I am not doing what I came here to do. A thousand words feels like a bazillion.


I have several Word documents open, four actually. Three of them are tarnished with about three hundred lazy words endeavoring to become a story, and the other is blank, waiting for me to type out another awful and horrific beginning to nothing. I am listening to autumn jazz, hoping the soothing instrumental will help stimulate my fingers across the keyboard, like it usually does, but today it is only making me yawn. 


A quote I heard a while ago comes to mind, about how staring at a blank page for hours is the exact thing that makes you a writer. Then, a story about a young girl whose mother asked her if she wanted to be a writer when she grew up, to which the little girl said, “I want to do the thinking part, but not the writing part.” At that, I mentally raise my hand in agreement with the wise youngling. Me too.


Part of me thinks I cannot come up with a story because I don’t want to let go, that I am still holding onto the stories I wrote in the last few weeks. They had poured directly out of my heart and soul, and I am scared they will be forgotten, become old news, if I relinquish another. I am scared to leave them behind. Writing something new feels like I am doing just that.


Another part of me knows what’s coming next is going to be absolute shit. It kind of happens that way when you’re a writer, an amateur one, anyway. A successful streak is called a streak for a reason. 


I am tempted to refresh my web browser page again; it’s become a nervous tick. Whenever I am not being productive at the keyboard, I click, click, click, and hope an idea will reveal itself the way a refreshed page is born anew. This time I stop my cursor before the click. It’s been almost two hours of this, starting a story, hating it (but not enough to delete it because...Just in case), clicking on my browser, then opening a new blank document. 


They say you can convince your brain you’ve had a good night’s sleep, even if you didn’t, and it will improve overall brain function as if you actually did sleep well. I try it: I have a great idea. I am full of ideas. 


Crickets. Well, not exactly. But really stupid ideas sometimes sound like annoying crickets.


I force myself to start with one of them. Get the awful ideas out, and maybe something better will arise.


The first story, which is pukingly awful, is about two teenage girls devising a plan to make some boy who wronged them fall in love with one of them so they could break his heart. In the end, the girl falls in love with the guy. It’s an overdone and cliché trope, but it is my life, and I’ve been listening to a lot of Louyah lately, which has made me feel quite romantic. I definitely stop it there at about three hundred and forty four words. I hate myself just a little bit more for even allowing the idea to live past one sentence.


Next, I go for the funny. A husband and wife stuck in the back of their daughter’s trunk, somehow having locked themselves inside after spying on her and her new boy friend (emphasis on the space between “boy” and “friend”). The wife and husband banter plays out hilariously in my head. I even consider adding a piece to the puzzle where the two of them try to get a little stoned in the middle of their shenanigans. The whole idea feels like something out of Modern Family, and it makes me giddy. But I spend almost an hour trying to make sense of the plot: how did they get in the back of her trunk without her noticing; how would they get out without keys; car alarms; the parents’ lie to their daughter about where they would be… I can’t make it work in my head. One hundred and seventy four words, and I’m already lost in my own story. 


I consider writing about God. Ugh. Though not my favorite topic, it’s an easy one since everyone has their own idea about Him, It, whatever. There’s no right or wrong when it comes to God, no answers really need explaining. If God were stuck in the trunk of a car, God could literally do anything about it. I think about God’s followers, and how easy a devoted and brain-washy type character would be fun to write about, especially aside its starkest opponent, an atheist. An LDS man and an atheist walk into a bar… An LDS man and an atheist are the only two who survived the war and now have to protect the architectural plans for God’s new temple… I lose interest before I even compose a first line. 


My time at the library is almost up and the deadline is tomorrow. I am annoyed with myself for not having a better grasp on this yet, but I try to not beat myself up. Negativity is the death of creativity. I tell myself, I got the wheels rolling, and a break will give my brain the leniency to be free flowing and loopy and silly. All of those things are constructive in writing. 


I pack up my computer, and make my way to my car. I give my mind permission to think of anything else. Then, of course, as I am sitting in traffic, I manage to actually think about something else – texting my dad back about an upcoming holiday trip wherein which an estranged uncle of mine might attend – when the idea comes to me. 


I’ll have to research how planes crash… (because obviously I’m going to kill the MC). 


The beginning paragraph is writing itself in my head, flooding through the gates, and I am infuriated that this is happening now, away from my computer. I try repeating the lines in my head over and over so they aren’t lost in the trade winds of my brain and gone forever. 


Holidays aren’t my favorite, but I know them. I know the drama, and all its moving parts. That’s a story I could write, I think. It might be a shit idea, but at least now I’ve got a plan. 

November 04, 2022 20:09

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20 comments

Helen A Smith
13:53 Nov 25, 2022

You captured the atmosphere in the library so well and all the angst of writing. I like how the writer knows what to write (even if it isn’t perfect) once the pressure is off and she’s away from the computer screen and how “a thousand words feels like a bazillion.” As little as that? Why do we do it to ourselves?

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AnneMarie Miles
06:33 Nov 26, 2022

Hi Helen, thank you for your words and taking the time to read my silly coping mechanism for my writers block. Do you ever find yourself writing in the library? That's my favorite place to write.

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Helen A Smith
12:44 Nov 26, 2022

Hi Anne Marie. I do visit a library, more to escape my job, maybe even to preserve my sanity, but I haven’t written anything there yet. I tend to write on my phone when I’m away from home so writing in the library is a possibility. I liked the way you captured the atmosphere of a library and the writer’s endless curiosity about other people. I loved the creative way you wrote about the dreaded writer’s block. Takes some doing to get through that, but you succeeded

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AnneMarie Miles
18:23 Nov 26, 2022

I could not imagine writing on my phone! Brava to you! As writer's we must be curious about others - their stories, their intentions, their thoughts. I find myself always wondering about the lives of strangers, or the people in the homes or cars passing by. "The Thinking Part" is quite a fitting title, and it's something I do often, though I certainly wish I did the writing part more! Now with Reedsy, it happens more, which is just the best gift I've given myself this year.

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Naomi Onyeanakwe
19:03 Nov 09, 2022

Suuuuupeerrrr relatable. Also enjoyable and funny. This was a good read. Well done and good luck with the contest!

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AnneMarie Miles
19:33 Nov 09, 2022

Thank you Naomi! I was hoping it would be more relatable than outright embarrassing so that is a relief! Thanks for taking the time to read!

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Naomi Onyeanakwe
10:48 Nov 10, 2022

You're welcome! And it is not embarrassing at alll. Also, I would appreciate if you could kindly give my work on this same prompt a read and leave feedback. Thank you!

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AnneMarie Miles
14:44 Nov 10, 2022

It's been a busy week so I thank you for asking or I would have forgotten! It is done :)

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Naomi Onyeanakwe
19:20 Nov 10, 2022

Thank youuu!

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Sophia Gavasheli
22:18 Nov 08, 2022

Ha! I was really intrigued by the trigger warning. You've captured the trials of being a writer really well. I could totally relate to this, especially the part about wanting to do the "thinking part", not the writing part. My best lines also come to me when I'm not trying to write, and it's so annoying because I can't write them down fast enough and they disappear...

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AnneMarie Miles
23:21 Nov 08, 2022

Hey Sophia, thank you! I honestly think the TW is my favorite part about this piece 😅 we all have that fear! And I do love the writing part too but only when it feels easy 😂 I now keep a notepad with me or a pen (I only use the notes app on my phone if I have to) because if I don't have something to capture a line or idea, it'll be gone forever.

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Michał Przywara
21:38 Nov 08, 2022

Heh :) Been there. Well, live there, really. It's a funny take on an all too familiar irritation, but you turned block into creativity, which is awesome. Plus, you hit on a great general solution. Infuriatingly, you can't force your brain to do what you want, but if you point it in a direction and give it freedom, it'll probably repay you with an idea, even if the timing is comically horrible. That whole "sleeping on it" thing is incredible sometimes. On a side note, that idea about the parents stuck in the trunk is awesome! If you eve...

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AnneMarie Miles
23:16 Nov 08, 2022

Thanks Michal! It is hard to imagine you struggling with writers block since everything I've read from you is so creative and out of (my) box! But I suppose not even the very best of writers are immune to it. It wasn't my best work, and it got approved super quick so I even missed a chance to go back and add all the late afterthoughts, but it did what I intended and unclogged my brain. Glad you enjoyed! And yes, the trunk idea is still brewing in my mind. I love the idea, I think my brain just hurt too much to make it work, but it'll co...

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Jack Bell
11:37 Nov 08, 2022

“staring at a blank page for hours” will certainly send you mad, which isn’t a bad start for a writer. I liked the meta-irony: a story about the desperate search for a story idea - at a writing prompt site. The story about the teen girls love snafu – “pukingly awful”? No way! It’s something PG Wodehouse would bring the house down with. I love that sort of story – a contest on that exact prompt would be a hoot. Reading, and very much enjoying, this, I’m reminded again that, for me, it’s all about the voice (cf Wodehouse again). The voice c...

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AnneMarie Miles
14:14 Nov 08, 2022

Thanks for your comments, Jack. I struggled this week for whatever reason, and my best solution was to write about that struggle. It instantly cleared the clog in my brain. Glad the teen girls appealed to you, there's always an audience out there somewhere, right? Maybe Hazel and Crystal will get their chance to metaphorically chop off some balls in the future. I'll check out Wodehouse. Thanks again for reading!

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Rebecca Miles
07:13 Nov 05, 2022

Perhaps all writers agree at first with your observed little girl: we want to do the thinking not the writing. But then we write, after much thought, and isn't it alchemy! It must be the holidays, and actually having time to rub a few ideas together but this got me recalling the library section early on in Virginia Woolf's amazing A Room of one's own. It is so erudite ( she was a brain on two legs) reflective AND funny. Your narrator's struggles to focus and direct her thoughts reminded me of the essay's section where Woolf's narrator obse...

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AnneMarie Miles
13:58 Nov 05, 2022

Hey hey sister, thanks for making the time for TWO of my stories, especially on your holiday. But yes, you're right; writing can be a challenge but it is one we love (at least when things go smoothly, thought, maybe we enjoy a bit of the challenge, too). I think after a few weeks of things going smoothly across my keyboard, I was beginning to feel a bit frustrated. I'm not happy with what I've accomplished this week but I am happy it was accomplished nonetheless! You've made me very interested in Woolf so I will be checking her out soon... I...

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Afnan 9
06:01 Jan 29, 2023

I will read this story in weekend ♥️

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MB Campbell
22:52 Nov 13, 2022

Love the ending.

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AnneMarie Miles
23:34 Nov 13, 2022

Thank you!

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