Rusty's Armory

MzMuse and Coffee

Posted on December 29, 2021

Well, here I sit, staring at a blank page on the word processor.  I have been a slacker when it comes to writing.  But I am OK with it because I met out the punishment for my laziness, and I rarely harm myself.

Fiction is dead to my brain.  I lay in bed and let my mind wander for new themes, but all I do is rehash the old ones.  I even drug Mz Muse out of retirement, and she simply agreed with me that I am a sluggard that is too lazy to even shovel food into my face.  She has ever been a fan of mine.

One of my adopted mentors, Gene Amole (of blessed memory) was a columnist with the now defunct Rocky Mountain News.  WWII vet who refused to glamorize war and was hyper-critical of Hollywood’s portrayal of it.  His biggest gripe was that men died silently when wounded.  Having taken part in the assault during the Normandy Invasion, his recollection was that the wounded were screaming in pain before dying.  Hard stuff.  But Gene also owned a classical music radio station in Denver and hosted a morning show.  Often you would hear birds chirping from an open window in the cramped studio.  How I miss that radio station, and how I miss his curmudgeonly posts on political hubris.

But to continue, his muse was an imaginary “idea fairy” that he had conversations with and would write down their conversation.  The idea fairy wore a ratty tutu and sat on his typewriter.  Yes, Virginia, there was a time when word processors did not have spelling and grammar checkers, and if you made a mistake, you had to cross the lines out with a pen and rewrite them.  He would post his conversations unedited, and you learned that the first draft of his column was a horror of typos, grammar errors and lousy formatting.  I took the idea of the idea fairy and made my own muse.  MzMuse.

MzMuse is a dour, frumpy middle-aged woman with hideous tastes in clothing.  She is modeled after an old boss of mine who was hardnosed and generous at the same time.  She wears a pink Rayon™ blouse, a brown woolen pencil skirt that sometimes shows the tops of her hose and the garter snaps.  Yeah.  Pretty dated.  But she is mine and I love her.

However, I decided to not resurrect her for this little missive.  I want to go somewhere with it, but the destination still hasn’t presented itself.  I am looking for something to kickstart my writing now that I am feeling better than I have in many years, though I am left feeble and easily winded by the ordeal.  I did not know that I was so damaged.

Onwards

Usually when I sit down to write and do not know where I am going, I put something down.  It can be nonsensical, or a peeve, or just an observation that kicks off the essay.  I am more of an essayist than a novelist.  After five hundred words or so, I have said all that was necessary.  But today, this is what has come to my mind.  I had hoped that I would have started a new tale rather than mull over my sad fate.  But it is what it is.  A writer writes.  If he does not write, he is not a writer.  So, write I shall.  Even if it is just a coffee post ..

Good morning!