Memories

The words were there. But they also weren’t. He could feel them on the tips of his fingers. Little jots awaiting their opportunity to jump onto the page. Three hours later the page was still blank. Stan knew that he could write. In fact, he had written many things. Columns for the local paper, a blog that had been running for several years, and even some magazine articles found their way from his mind into print. Yes, Stan had seen the words appear, both on paper through a blue pen, and on-screen in boring black pixels. Yet still, there he sat, cold black coffee on the table next to the laptop. The cursor blinked on screen wanting to move down the page.

He needed to find a way to break this block. A stroll; perhaps a walk around the neighborhood would clear his mind and get the juices flowing. But even that felt weird. What sort of juices did he want to have flowing? His experience in writing ranged through various topics during his writing career. He had been through writer’s block before of course. This time it was weeks rather than the few days from before. He walked outside into the brisk autumn air of Michigan while he donned his coat. The cold was his best friend. The cold was the entire reason for his move from Georgia to Michigan. Isolation in a small town, equipped with his pen and notebook, beautiful cold days to spur on many a tale.

The neighborhood where he lived was large. To put it in perspective, each property owner maintained several acres, and the roads around all of them were miles long. A walk would end up eating the better part of two hours. The first snow had not yet kissed the cold earth, but the signs were in the air for it to be on its way. The walk was going well. As Stan meandered down the empty streets, his mind wandered to exotic places. Places he previously visited, places as of yet unseen to his eyes, and even places that may not even exist. Stan’s mind wandered to the beautiful heights of heaven and the darkest depths of hell. Nothing sparked any interest in his writer’s mind. It seemed everyone thoroughly covered those topics already. Frustrated, the time passed and he ended up back at his house, uninspired.

Sleep came easily that night. His warm bed and wood stove fought the cold from entering his house and his thoughts were mellow. When he awoke, the coffee pot issued its finished beeps and he descended the stairs to make a cup. As he grabbed his favorite mug from the hanger the handle snagged, and the mug flew from his hand. It crashed onto the cream-colored tile floor, splintering into hundreds of pieces. He cursed and bent to pick up the pieces. As he picked up the chunks, he saw a scrap of paper tucked under a cabinet. He eased the paper from under the wood and unfolded it revealing its secrets.

The paper contained a child’s drawing. A big scary monster covered in spikes and scales attacking a small village. Fire spewed from its open maw as it burned the countryside. The child who drew the picture had a story in mind. If a picture is worth a thousand words, would this picture serve as motivation for a story? Could that story break the writer’s block? Excitement for the first time in weeks coursed through his veins. Opening the computer, the excitement was barely containable. If he could just get something down, create some coherent story, it could well lead to the next one. Opening the word processor, broken coffee cup forgotten, he sat to type. As his butt touched down onto the padded chair, the cursor blinked. He set the child’s picture next to the computer. His hands found their position over the qwerty. They hovered. Fingers at the ready, he pressed a key. No, I mean the “a” key. “A” was all he typed. Nothing else. It was as though his fingers had been arrested, cuffed, and tossed into solitary confinement.

Annoyed, he slammed the computer shut. He stood and walked back through the kitchen to the coffee pot. His bare feet found the small shards of ceramic he had never swept up. Pain shot through his feet as the needles of mug stabbed through his skin. He cursed again. Broken cup, no stories, and now bleeding feet. What else would this day entail? He picked out of his feet the larger of the shards, then grabbed a towel to staunch the bleeding. He limped over and retrieved the broom to sweep the mess. The broom collected the pieces as it was directed across the floor and under the cabinets. Satisfied in sweeping up his favorite cup, Stan tossed the refuse into the trash. Slight stabs of pain echoed up through his feet and he made his way to the bathroom. The tweezers made quick work of removing the little pricks.

After patching up his pincushion feet, he made his way back to the computer. The cursor blinked next to the capital A. Where the hell had he planned to take that story? All memory of it gone, only the dull ache from his feet remained. He looked at the child’s artwork. A great treasure to some parent, but trash to Stan. His anger lashed out at the drawing. Tearing it into shreds helped alleviate the loss of his coffee cup. Oh right, the mug his wife had gotten him. It read “World’s Best Author”.

The bitterness and loss welled inside him. It overflowed from his eyes, dribbling down his cheeks and falling onto his now aching chest. She was a truly wonderful woman. The best he had ever found. Her beauty was unmatched in his eyes. The memory of it came back to him through the fog of drunken Michigan nights. Georgia had taken his wife. The accident was a horrendous mess of twisted metal and glass. Fluids ran from under the car, fluids ran out of his wife’s broken body. He had arrived minutes after the accident. They were talking on the phone, going to meet for dinner, when she was obliterated by a drunk driver. He knew what road she was on, so when he heard the accident he immediately went there. He cried, his body once again wracked with pain. The outpouring of emotion lasted til snot was running from his nose and his throat hurt. He was a year and three weeks sober today. The accident anniversary was tomorrow.

He ached for a drink, but that wasn’t the way. He was always better sober, she would tell him that. At least he thought she would. He got up and grabbed another coffee mug. Pouring coffee was hard and he spilled more than a little. He topped the coffee with cream and sugar. Sipping the hot coffee was a nice balm to his hurting throat. Once again he sat at the laptop. Coffee in its rightful place to the right of the keyboard. The cursor blinked. The capital A stared back at his red eyes and recently dried cheeks. The laptop was once again slammed shut. A little too hard by the sound of it. He opened it to look upon the broken screen.

He walked from the kitchen to his study. Books lined every wall, shelves full of volumes from authors great and small. He sat in the large brown chair which was the only seating in the room. A small wooden table with a single drawer sat next to the comfy recliner. Stan slid the drawer open to remove its contents. A blue inked pen and a legal pad. It had been years since these utensils were used. Four years, since Margarette died. His shaking hand didn’t aid in his attempt to put his elegant writing on the page. As the ink bled into the white paper, more tears bled from his eyes. It was her. Time to write about her. His hand scrolled its refined letters onto the page as he poured her life onto it.