I just composed a missive whose grace startled me. What a consolation to be able to sing! How capacious this medium which allows me to sing about almost anything at any time. Words may outlast the woes of their moment, a hope which supplies authors a mystic victory: they may seem to have lost the game of life, but who knows? (Vide, the Emily Dickinson Society.)

I am grateful for my facility. That I often write with ease does not mean I write well. Many great writers have struggled composing and many inferior writers have composed with ease. Easy writers may be prone to sloppiness or garrulity, which dilute their effect. The writing in my journals, for example, must be boiled from sap to syrup. My sap is often sappy.

The blessing of ease is the confidence I can turn on the tap and let my contents flow. I can almost always get myself talking and if I can’t the obstruction doesn’t last. Writing I discover, as words press me past the perimeters of the already said. I make no claim my discoveries are Galilean (as in Galileo), only new to me, so I feel, while writing, as if I were “doing something,” adding my mite to eternity’s store. The possibility that my words will outlive me is almost preferable to the assurance. What a vindication that would be! Won’t they – that shadowy throng of doubters and detractors – be surprised!

It may be argued that these delights are fantastic, self-delusory, which is true enough, but aren’t all joys imaginary, shimmering mirages in the desert of actuality? “The natural flights of the human mind,” wrote Dr. Johnson, “are not from pleasure to pleasure but from hope to hope.” Experience predictably disappoints anticipation. My attraction to solitude is philanthropy, not misanthropy. Aren’t humans always prettier in posse than in esse?

Writing I do not notice time, of all our afflictions the most dismal. It’s not that “time flies,” as during thrilling activities, but that it ceases to exist, because I cease to exist, except as a conduit. Is time time if it passes unobserved?

Writing alleviates my private concerns by snugging me into a universal pattern. Nothing that injures me has not been suffered before, which consoles incalculably. Misery loves company. Observing how typical I am, how ordinary, makes me smile. “Why seems it so particular with thee?”

The news becomes less dreadful after writing reduces it to material. Horrible events make exciting episodes. During the dissolution of my first marriage, I’d weep and wail until diverted by the interest of my predicament and its narrative potential. I almost welcomed anguish, happiness could be such a yawn.

Writing obligates me to make my moment entertaining to readers, a group which includes myself. Writers are both actors and audience of their stories. The better I relate my story, the more I enjoy it.

I write for readers who are always eagerly waiting, whether or not they exist in fact. All other arts must be consumed currently to satisfy. Unsold paintings pile up, unheard music sobs, performers can’t forever rejoice in their mirrors’ applause. Writers may be discovered long after their bones are dust, with no diminution of their force. (Vide, the Emily Dickinson Society.) Mightn’t my words enthrall an eventual collegian as Thoreau’s enchanted me? Improbable and impossible are antonyms, not synonyms.

My joy is precarious, my intelligence easily confused. I’m readily bored and susceptible to onslaughts of despair. Writing protects me from these deadly demons. When I write my world comes right. How lucky is that!