Finessing The Muse: Morning Pages

As part of my on-going struggle to coax my muse out of hiding, I’ve decided to give morning pages another try. As you’re probably aware this is an exercise that was made popular by Julia Cameron the author of The Artists Way. This isn’t the first time I’ve tried this, and I don’t recall it being all that helpful the first time around. OTOH, I didn’t keep up with it for more than a few months because, eventually, my muse got fed up with hanging around in the morning, waiting while I filled three pages in a notebook with stream of consciousness nonsense, and began demanding I pay attention to her again.

Maybe I’ll get lucky and history will repeat itself. But in the meantime…

Julia Cameron wasn’t the first person to suggest the idea of writing first thing in the morning. A hundred or so years ago, when I was first thinking about writing as a career (not really a hundred, but MORNINGS! can make it feel that way) I read a book by an author whose name I can’t recall, and whose book I probably don’t have anymore, thanks to last summer’s move…about which I still shudder. But, whoever she was, she also believed that waking up in the morning and IMMEDIATELY writing down whatever was in your head was a great idea.

The biggest difference, IIRC, between her system and Cameron’s, is that her idea was to mine for the elusive gold buried in your subconscious, and that was supposedly easier to reach before you were properly awake.

Cameron doesn’t believe in gold. (Okay, I suppose she does given her OTHER book, A Vein of Gold, but that’s beside the point.) She thinks your brain is full of shit in the morning (as opposed to ALL DAY, which is how it feels at the moment) and she wants you to clear away the dross, so you can be creative. Her morning pages have strict rules…most of which I’ve forgotten, and although I’m currently reading her new book, It’s Never Too Late to Begin Again, I think I’m going to have to invest in a new copy of The Artist’s Way—or perhaps, The Miracle of Morning Pages, yet another book about…yes, you’ve guessed it. Morning Pages—in order to refresh my memory.

But for now: the Morning Pages Rules as I understand and remember them, include: Write by hand, for three pages, no stopping, stream of consciousness (which I could do all day, btw, even without a fully-functioning muse…if I had the time and nothing else to do…and who has that?). You don’t record your dreams, you don’t jot down story ideas, you don’t make lists of things you want to do later in the day, you don’t make lists about ANYTHING, really…

No lists? Right. And here I am making a list of rules, which goes to show you how well I follow instruction. But it’s HARD not to make lists, because I LOVE lists…no. Love’s not the right word. I can’t think of the right word, but that’s another rule, I suppose, no stopping to look up the right word.

Speaking of right words and how they’re occasionally elusive (interesting word, elusive. I always have to pause and remember which one I want elusive, illusive, allusive…definitely elusive right now but it’s always jarring when someone uses the wrong one. There are a few words like that. Hoard/horde, etc. and I do tend to forget some of them and write the wrong one and feel like an uneducated idiot who can’t even master one language, never mind more than one…do I really want to go on with this train of thought? No, not really).

So, as I started to say, I’ve noticed that the right words are occasionally not as easy to locate as they used to be, and having experienced age-related dementia with several relatives now, I worried. My niece was REALLY worried about my sister, which isn’t fair because her memory has always been shit. But we both feel better now, ever since I shared with her an article I recently read that claimed the main two differences between younger people who can’t immediately recall a word and older people, is that the younger people don’t immediately assume they’re losing their minds. Also, the file cabinets of their memories…does anyone even use file cabinets anymore? Aren’t they like take out menus, rolodexes,  and CDs? WHATEVER.

Younger people have memory files that aren’t as extensive. There are less files to wade through to find that word. A lot less, in some cases. So we’re content in the belief that my brain, and my sister’s brain, aren’t failing. They’re just scaling mountains of accumulated knowledge. I like that. I’m not sure I believe it, but it’s such a pretty lie.

But…back to my non-list of morning page related struggles. There are a lot of things I have to do in the morning, and lying in bed scribbling in a notebook isn’t one of them. There are dogs to let out, and frequently a toddler to entertain--and feed, which definitely requires me to get out of bed—and on Wednesdays, when he’s with us, said toddler must be made ready for when the garbage truck arrives (which is in the morning, because of course it is).

Standing at the front door, watching the garbage truck move slowly up and down the street, waving to the driver, imitating the beep-beep-beep whenever it’s backing up, is one of THE HIGHLIGHTS of this child’s life right now. He loves all trucks, but garbage trucks most of all. We don’t know why.

He also loves cooking and cleaning. The former I understand, the latter—not so much. Also, pretend “cleaning”? Not the greatest thing. It tends to leave more of a mess rather than less, so…

Coffee! Coffee is an issue in the morning.  It is, therefore, an issue that my morning pages tend to be rather full of. The nameless author from a thousand years ago suggested placing a thermos of coffee beside your bed at night so that you wouldn’t have to get up and make coffee and miss out on the mining. I don’t do that, although I have in the past, because the coffee is never hot enough and then I’m mad, and all I can think about is COFFEE.

I can’t recall if Julia allows you to get up and make coffee before you begin, but I do it anyway, for the most part. And I let out the dogs. And I feed the child, if he’s here, and I think about how nice it would be to sit outside on my terrace with my coffee cup and my notebook…but not this morning, because our next door neighbors are having their house tented, so all my terrace furniture (and my potted plants, and the child’s pool toys, etc.) are stacked on the far side of the terrace because the crew who’s tenting the house needs to be in the yard…which the dogs are going to love. Not. Sigh.

Let’s move on…

Another problem I’ve noticed is that I’m out of practice writing by hand. Because, other than lists…and birthday cards…and addresses…and quick notes to my husband, or my daughter…lists. It always comes back to lists with me. I could list all the things I make lists of, but…another time.

OTHER THAN LISTS, I don’t really write by hand much anymore.  And, as a result, three pages can make my hand hurt. I  think it’s because I’m trying to write too fast. I’ve gotten used to the speed of typing and my thoughts don’t want to stand still and wait until my pen can capture them. So I write too fast and my handwriting, already not the best, is now completely illegible. Which I guess doesn’t matter, since morning pages are not really the kind of thing you’d need to read anyway. Not even anything you’d want to read (as this proves). I suppose I could re-fresh my knowledge of shorthand and try that, but I feel like that is too much effort.

Probably the real problem is that I’m left-handed, so most notebooks are problematic anyway. And I’ve just forgotten how much. But, that’s also besides the point, because that shouldn’t be the case with the nice new notebook I indulged in, before I read/remembered that I’m supposed to keep my morning pages in a separate notebook, although why?  And also: isn’t that kind of a waste of paper? Not that it all isn’t a waste of paper anyway, when you think about it. It’s really not the most environmentally friendly practice, is it? Paper = dead trees and I like trees, but let’s not go there. Besides, my son just introduced an entire line of biodegradable, environmentally friendly tattoo supplies (it’s a cool idea, and a nice website. You should check it out, if you’re into things like that. https://fortetattootechnology.com/)

So maybe the family karma balances out somehow? Whatever. It’s too early in the day to get into things like that.

My notebook cover is faux leather (because I didn’t need dead animal guilt on top of the dead tree guilt which continues to consume me no matter how hard I try to pretend otherwise. Family karma? Really?). It’s red, with a cute dragon embossed on the front. And it does seem like a shame to fill it with my useless, hideous scrawl. But the notebook is pretty and it’s refillable/reusable (re-read note on pretending not to feel guilt) and I like it. And part of the reason I started this whole practice was because my muse likes pretty things. Like the tulips on my table. A gift from our neighbors—they of the tented house. Did I mention that I also had to have my lovely bougainvillea (that was growing against the neighbors’ wall) cut back practically to the ground?

And that’s disappointing and another reason I will not be enjoying my coffee on the terrace this morning…but that’s three pages, so I guess I’m done anyway.