Swimming Among the Rainbows
Inspiration. It comes and goes like a spark. As a writer, you have to be there with materials on hand, at all times, so that the heat of the spark can ignite your tinder and get those creative juices flowing whenever inspiration may strike.
But what do you do when the creative juices stop flowing? When the barrel is empty and the last drip of creativity has dropped from the spigot and landed with a thud on the page?
The author of the Junior Bender novels, Timothy Hallinan, writes fine stories and makes the writing seem easy. He writes to music; at the end of his novels he lists the music he listened to while writing. I know other writers who write only at night, or only in a dark room, or only wearing earplugs. I find that I can write pretty much anywhere, as long as it’s quiet. But when I’m done and need a break, there’s one thing, more than anything else, that gets me ready to write again.
I swim. Wherever I am. My favorite place to swim is along the beach on Cape Cod, in the bay, where the water is cold and much less rough than the open ocean on the outside of the Cape where the conditions are more suitable for surfing.
It doesn’t matter whether the sun is shining, whether the swim is long or short, whether I exert myself or take it easy. Each swim is different, but emerging is always a little like being reborn.
Last summer, after a particularly nasty argument with one of my characters, I was ready to throw in the towel. I’d really had it. I put on my bathing suit, grabbed my goggles and the bright orange balloon I attach to my waist when I go for a long swim. It gives me something to hold onto if I get tired or find myself out too far, and it gives notice to boats that there’s a swimmer in the vicinity. On this particular day there wasn’t a boat to be seen. It was windy and raining, and I went out against even my own better judgment. When I entered the water it was cold, and the surf was so high it was hard to believe this was the bay side. I had to breathe turning to one side only to avoid inhaling the waves.
I swam my normal distance, the length of seven piers, keeping an eye on the beach to ensure that I remained in a constant relationship to the shore. At the seventh pier I stopped, breathing hard, put my feet on the sea bottom, took off my goggles, and looked around me.
It was almost evening. The wind had died down, the clouds had given way and the sun, on its way to setting, was resting above the horizon behind me. Over my head the sky was blue, and I was in the middle of a small, intense rainbow about 200 yards wide, with one end emerging from the water on my left, and the other seeming to land on the beach on my right. Everything seemed backlit in gentle pastel tones. Breathless with joy and amazement, I wished I had a camera, but I knew no camera could capture the experience. I have had to be content to remember it.
That moment was a real gift. It continues to be a deep well of inspiration, and I still bring it to mind whenever I need it. Perhaps it was nature’s way of letting me know that inspiration does exist, even if I don’t believe in it.
Photo: Nigel Howe/Flickr 2.0 CC