Writing Exercise #1

They say writers should write, well because that's just what they do. I often times find myself turning to the keyboard rather than a friend's ear to get out into the great expanse what's on my mind. What's troubling me or perhaps perplexing me. What's got my goat or what's inspired me. They say writing is the best thing to do. When you're a writer that is.

I've known people who don't know alliteration from a salutation from masturbation. Just like I know people who can't carry a tune. One of my best friends sounds like a rusty organ pipe choked by cobwebs when he tries to hum a tune. The man can't even whistle, something I just can't comprehend. They say writing comes easiest to writers much in the same way that melody and harmony comes naturally to those who sing.

They say writers should write for hours a day because after all it's an exercise. Just as flabby thighs and bellies that hang five inches over the belt line can happen to the sloth, so too can writer's block congest a good word man. So I sit down and write.

I go to karaoke bars to mostly have fun but also to practice my singing. Sounds lame, I know, but it's the truth. I just have to sing for others to hear rather than keeping it cooped up in my car at volume 45. So, too, I write. I write for a living, but it's not the same. I doubt plumbers who unclog shit from backed up toilets all day run home to plunge the porcelain god at home. It's like the old OBGYN who goes home with the last thing on his mind being the female genitalia. For every beautiful one there's 150,000 fat, smelly, hairy organs to prod, test and smear. Granted not a happy thought, but it certainly sums up how I feel about the whole situation.

So I write, not knowing exactly what will spring forth on the computer screen from the flurry of fingerings upon keys. It's like cardio for my digits. I ran tonight for the first time in weeks. It felt good, like sitting down and writing a while. It relieves stress, and dammit people like me. It's self re-affirmation at its barest best. It's a beautiful woman who longs for my attention. It's the frenetic frustration of the office. It's me.

So I write without a care. Because its simple. It's better than fumbling on the guitar, because I'm better at it.

It's an art. And so I write more. But I also read.

Reading is the true lost art of this generation. To be a good writer you have to read. Hemingway, Faulkner, hell Charles Schultz. Just read, dammit. TV is crap, let's face it. There are a few semi-redeeming shows currently on the air, take "House M.D." for example, but all else is a half-hour to an hour closer to your death.

So writing is reading is living. Take it from me, a writer in L.A. I MUST know what I'm talking about.