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It’s the blank page which always gets you first — the emptiness of a blank piece of A4 or Letter or whatever else you try to get started on. It’s almost taunting you, asking to be sullied by your mistakes — because you will make mistakes. You’ll write something wrong, scribble it out, and brush away eraser marks in a desperate attempt to make it seem like you knew what you were doing. It’s those first steps, those first marks, those first changes that somehow will become the greatest obstacles, the pauses that will overwhelm you.
It’s writer’s block, of course. I’ve dressed it up with a few pretty words, a poetic line or two, but it’s hard to make writer’s block more than it is. I mean, how can you speak ill or well about the inability to take a step forward? Writer’s block feels like a near animalistic instinct that somehow has become a part of the writings that make us so perfectly human — it’s fight or flight transcended.
What is it about the new beginnings that give us pause, make us want to step back and make no move? And then, once we do move, what opens those floodgates and lets us write and create and do? Where is that dam, by whom is it manned, and by which order does it open and close?
I don’t have answers to these questions. Hell, I didn’t really have any intent to answer them, or even try. I am no philosopher, and there are people far more qualified and far more willing to spend their lives in pursuit of that truth. I’m no more than a person scribbling inane words into a notebook as the Greyhound hits every single pothole from here to Gary, Indiana, throwing my pen across the page.
And as I gaze out, I look upon the American Midwest, upon fields filled with corn and wheat, populated by the odd roving tractor and dotted with American flags blowing in winds that come down from the mountains and make you feel as if you could somehow turn into a tumbleweed and roll away.
I look upon the blank slate outside my window and I sit and I wonder what could have been, or what may be still.
There’s something haunting about those endless, monotonous fields that stretch so far off into the distance and blur the line between horizon and sky. There’s something eerie about the strange buildings that crop up between rows upon rows upon rows of yellow corn, silos standing empty out of season. They could even be mistaken for homes, if one were to look quickly enough. It’s the American Midwest, it’s the lands that were built by farms and automobiles which faced blow after blow in the aftermath of crises. It’s the part of this country that once built America and then lay, kneeling and begging, for something to keep itself afloat. The giants of industry that once looked out on those fields are gone now — their creations lie dormant, sold off to other countries or shut down from mismanagement.
And yet, it’s the American Midwest that cannot lose its quiet monotony. It cannot stop being that land of wander and wonder and strange exploration that sits on lakes so vast and deep that they’re known simply as “Great.” It’s land that still echoes with the heartbeat of America.
I write this on a bus trip to Chicago, Illinois. And on this trip, I think I’m falling in love with Sandusky, Ohio. And honestly, I have no idea how in the hell I got here.
Well, I do know how I got here. I wasn’t kidnapped, I made the conscious decision to go to the Midwest, to sit on a rickety bus that smelled a little and creaked a lot and managed to make me question if the last hundred years of automobile innovation really did happen (or if I’d just managed to pick the only Greyhound this side of the Mississippi that hadn’t discovered suspension). I’ve been disabused of that notion (no Greyhound has suspension, it’s just part of the appeal).
Regardless, while I was getting jostled around, I had very little to do except think about Chicago. The city is baked into American history, it’s a part of our culture and our image, and yet, it feels so out of place. We know about the sparkles of Los Angeles, the city of Angels that shines beaming in California as a beacon to creativity, Hollywood, and art. We know of New York, sitting on the other side, calling out in its own way, with its towering skyline, stories, and the bright lights of Times Square. What do we know of Chicago? I mean we all know Chicago, and yet, why? What is it about Chicago that makes it so breathtakingly important and yet, just a city, in the Midwest?
America was born of quaint villages, oppressive plantations, and ports. We’ve heard of Plymouth Rock, but honestly that’s a rock I’d much rather avoid landing on. And we know about the legacy of the plantation south — I am assured you all have begun, and finished, sixth grade history.
But what of ports? They’re just as important: a foundational pillar of a country, the trade and commerce and blending of cultures and communities. You can’t simply live off the land, or close off the world. You could try, I mean, there’s nobody stopping you, except for the IRS and probably the Park Rangers. But eventually, someone will show up at your door with a suitcase, a handful of trinkets you don’t need, and an offer for some random thing you didn’t really think anyone would be interested in. Before you know it, you’d be a pawn of trade just like everyone else.
It’s a shame, really, but it makes for good storytelling.
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