Sunday 13 September 2009

Drinking and writing.

It has been a rough weekend. I was at a wedding all day Friday and last night I went to see The Lemonheads. I must have consumed several weeks worth of drink. I am only recovering now- and it is three thirty in the afternoon!

I was up early this morning as I had agreed to meet a friend for breakfast. I don't really get headaches the next day but I was disorientated. I am in no fit shape to write in that condition.

It is a funny thing- some people believe that drinking helps the creative process but for me it only blurs how I think and my mental capacity is badly affected.

While drunk- the imagination also becomes more base. One starts to think only of food and procreation! Not that those things are necessarily bad, it's just that the complexities of life can be filtered out when writing under the influence.

And of course, that is the point. One of the reasons why drink is so attractive is because life does seem less difficult while drunk. You feel you can take on the world and win.

I guess that some of the people who find that drink helps them write, suffer from a confidence issue. But it may only help in this limited way- one can find the courage to commit words to the page when an otherwise self critical mind imposes a writer's block.

Later I will put a Muse CD into my sound system, turn on the laptop and get a couple of thousand words written. It is a process I fully enjoy, as I work my way towards the end of another novel.

I will be sober.

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