There’s something to be said for paper, which seems ironic considering I am typing this right now. But let us not confuse my love of paper for some loathing of typing on my part – I enjoy typing (now, at least), and it is a vastly useful writing tool. I am fortunate to be of a generation that the rise of the machine (computers, as you call them) was introduced during my youth, and when my sixth-grade teacher pleaded with my parents to get me a “typing machine” so that my abhorred handwriting would not hamper everything in my life, from high school to college to jobs to anywhere/everywhere printed words come in handy, and since I am a writer, the written word is big, my parents obliged.
I cannot imagine being gifted with the ability to write thousands of words a day and have to literally cut up the sheets of typed (with a typewriter, now) pages in order to test out the rearranging of a paragraph/s like Stephen King did for quite some time.
OR go back an age when you are not able to type on any typing mechanism *YIKES and are forced to use flowing handwritten script all the time. And yes, you have to carefully write and even more carefully read back what you have written by hand, which can take some time and effort, especially if your handwriting requires some deciphering as mine does.
Back to my point: typing good, but man, oh man, there’s something to be said for paper!
Today and tonight I find himself in one of those states/moods/feelings/migraines where I cannot wrap my head around any of the stories I am currently writing, including the exciting new one I just started (that normally would signal consecutive days of near-effortless – at least it feels like that now haha – marathon writing as I come out of the gate like a Triple Crown Winner).
Today, I have done writing work, but in the morning, afternoon, and night, I have struggled to dive in and do anything productive with my projects.
And then an idea came to me.
I could break out a new notebook, and my favorite pen, for my new story and see if anything comes from perusing a few previous pages of notes that I have on the tale and trying to simply let things flow.
Studies have shown that entirely different areas of the brain light up when someone uses a lit screen (as I stare at right now) versus when they use a pen and paper for tasks; and people remember things better, understand things better.
As soon as I read it, I knew it was true for me. So many different things happen when the pulpy textures of the pages brush against your hands and the pen or pencil is used to work in symmetry with your brain, your nerves, and your muscles in order to press ink or lead or paint onto the surface to create art.
Personally, I find paper more natural, and my mind and soul seem to soar when given the freedom to abandon the cursor for the blank space on the page. I could not tell you why that is the way for me. I can only say that taking the notebook in hand and creating there I feel like Harrison Bergeron after he has thrown off his handicaps.
I may write a lot, or a little. But some kind of ideas pertaining to my newly beloved (story, *sh!) will emerge onto the paper tonight. Whether they be dialogue, prose, an entire chapter or passage, or just a myriad set of small inconsequent notes, they will be of value. They always are.
The advice that is so often given and taken remains true now as ever: just get it down - get it down on the page. The writing in your head is not writing yet, it needs to be born. What is better than the page?
This is great R.J.! Gaiman does a ton of longhand writing, and I believe he wrote all of Stardust with a fountain pen!
Write on! I think there might be something to that in art making as well. I did so much digital stuff for so long without physically painting and then when I dusted off the tubes of paint and found my brushes I was aware of a change in thought and approach.
Great observation!