The sun disappeared into the barren, frozen cornfield some seven hours ago and yet here I sit tapping the keys of my computer -- writing, engaging myself in what I believe to be a noble vocation. Except it doesn't feel noble at the moment. It just feels like I'm driving at night without headlights and no one should do that, not even professional drivers on a closed course. I am attempting to communicate a thought that hasn't taken form. Or, maybe, I'm attempting to communicate a thought that rubs me the wrong way. Regardless, the [digital] ink isn't going to fall like dew to give anyone pause. And this too is the writing life, the insanity. Frustration equals writing. No. Writing equals frustration. At least it does tonight.
I know what my problem is and it isn't fatigue...isn't solely fatigue. It's these things that I bet my future on -- these words that wield so much power and potential to move people or change minds or spur reflection -- tonight they pale so completely when compared to the power of the printed image. What's a picture worth? A thousand words? How about 65,000 words? That's roughly a book-length work.
If you believe, like me, that writing is a noble craft, you engage it until your hands and your heart are soiled with words, which are beautiful, powerful, provacative things. Beware. Don't believe, like me, that nothing can eclipse words in their ability to inspire, to transport us to a far off place or time long passed. Like me, a picture may fall into your hands to humble you, to make you question all you ever believed about words and their promises. This picture came to me two days ago and I hadn't known of its existence before receiving it. This picture is keeping me from a warm bed and silly dreams that I probably won't remember upon waking.
This woman is Ann, though her name is written as Anna on the back. Also on the back is a note that her hair is black, her eyes are brown, her beads are red and her dress is red and tan. Missing from the back is the date the photo was taken.I have a picture of Ann taken ten years before this one, I have one of her taken roughly fifteen years after this one, and I have one taken of her when she looked like a grandmother -- my grandmother. Moreover, I have stories to go with those pictures, stories of young Ann, stories of single mom Ann, stories of senior citizen Ann. I have these stories because I wrote them; they are the core of a book I spent three years writing in an effort to honor Ann. But there's nothing in the book about a beauty with brown eyes and wavy bob. I cherish this newly emerged picture, but the thousand or so words that hide in the shadows behind her are a gaping hole in her story that now haunts me.
And so I'm left to ponder what is more powerful, the words or the image? Right now, I'll say it's the image because it's all I have. The words are hidden, perhaps forever.
