Why do non-writers get out of bed in the morning?

My fellow traveler Randall Damon has been reading George Orwell again. Damned if that Orwell doesn't say some true things. Here's what he says, in an essay titled "Why I Write," about what separates Other People from writers:

The great mass of human beings are not acutely selfish. After the age of about thirty they almost abandon the sense of being individuals at all—and live chiefly for others, or are simply smothered under drudgery. But there is also the minority of gifted, willful people who are determined to live their own lives to the end, and writers belong in this class.

The truth is, I have never been able to imagine how anyone endures pain without the promise of expressing it in writing, and I've never known what good is joy if there's no chance to get it across to others.

I see non-writers the same way some men see women: As a riddle I can't (quite) solve, but not through a lack of trying.

Boots readers, you're mostly writers: Can you imagine your life organized around anything else?

Comments

[Mark Harmel]

There is visual communication. In my case still photography, moving towards moving pictures. I like photos mixed in with writing or even just by themselves.

I often wonder why some people use so many words?

[David Murray]

Mark, I'm just discovering my ability to mix video and photos with my windbaggery, and I agree, it's extra fulfilling.

I'm best at words, so I'm going to use them most as I did in this series ....

http://writingboots.typepad.com/writing_boots/rambling/

... but pictures and video capture things that words don't, and they're fun to do.

[Kristen]

To answer your question, David - No. The concept of a world in which I didn't write gives me a flash-back to the 60's TV show Lost in Space and a quote from the robot: "Does not compute. Danger! Danger Will Robinson!!!"

To answer Mark's question: Sometimes, Mark, the words just burble up unceasingly, out of every nook and cranny in us, and if we didn't find a way to put them down somewhere some way to express the myriad of feelings, thoughts and experiences that plague us, well, we'd explode. Speaking strictly for myself, I do make a concerted effort to only use the right words, and not to annoy the non-writers in my world over-much with my addiction to words.

Thank goodness then, for places like David's blog, where I, and others like me can indulge - guilt-free - our manias for vocabulary, grammar, syntax and an unabashed love of using and sharing lots and lots of words!

[amy]

The thought of a word without self-expression and connection through individuals' self-expression is completely depressing.