Today’s post was supposed to be about my side kick and writing partner – Pickles. I had proof in hand on my digital camera to show just how helpful she can be.
With my deafness, visual is the next best thing to listening. Visuals freeze and save moments, settings, movements, expressions. I can take my time studying images. Images call forth words, words that I use, words that comfort, words that show, words that tell a story.
But I can’t upload the pictures.
Who would have thought dropping the gadget in the dog’s water bowl by mistake would be a problem?
So what does a writer (specifically me) do when she gets in a foul mood? I write.
Bits of angst drip on the page. Words boil. Distress is fuel. I use words instead of visuals to describe what I want you to see:
A silly grin from a canine friend lets me know that under no circumstance do I dare settle down until I’ve paid her fee, her due, her right. A wet nose sits wedged between my laptop and my lap, making sure I don’t forget. She’s there if I need her and I am to be there should she need me. That’s the pact. Working dog, time piece, companion, a warm body that takes up 2/3rds of everything, leaving me the rest. Reach out at any given moment, she says, and feel the movement of my breathing. Standing on all four legs on the couch she tells me it’s time. She reminds. It’s time. Her breathing allows life to move beneath my fingers before words move from fingertips to key strokes to screen. She breathes life. That’s her story. That’s what she writes. Compared to her, no foul mood, no rusted ceiling, no busted camera is much, in comparison - at all.
A writer writes.
-Indigo
