How I Think

I think in pictures. I know it's because I have near-photographic recall, such was being able to tell you, without looking, what cans of soup there are in my pantry right now (one can of Campbell's tomato, one Progressive chicken rotini), how many cans of tuna (one, Tonga tuna), and assorted other oddness (I know there is a can of sardine in the back left rear corner for when my dad visits, and a jar of horseradish and beets for Slavic recipes we make). I not only know that I HAVE them. I know what they are next to, and it's not because I organize them in any fashion. It's because I can "see" it in my head. That sort of oddness.

My Oldest Son thinks differently. He doesn't think in pictures. Today we organized his school supplies. He has Even days and Odd days, and subjects divided according to the day. Because he is brilliant, but very absent minded, I write in Sharpies on everything--notebook that comes home, even day, notebooks that stays in class, notebook for such-and-such a class, and his locker combination in both an even day book and an odd day. Then I have an even day bin in my office and an odd day bin. Somehow, I hope to give him the tools to apply his genius . . . and to see his disorganized way of thinking as a blessing that can be not squashed or even "overcome" but simply channeled. He sais he is going to like his geometry teacher. I thank the gods. His geometry teacher is, according to Oldest Son, "left handed, and doesn't care if your binder is messy or even if you have dividers." I smiled and said, "Since he's teaching gifted kids, my guess is, as a left-handed math genius--same as you--he kept his binder the way you do . . . and he is OK with how you learn." I wish more teachers were like that.

But all this on "how I think" versus how someone else thinks can be extended to writing. I can't write when I am extremely stressed, for instance. The words don't come. I'm too distracted. I stare at the same words over and over and over again. I wish writing was my SOLACE then . . . but it isn't. Writing is what flows out of me when I feel reasonably at peace (and face it, with four kids, "peace" is relative). People ask me how I can write with a Naked Demon Baby playing air guitar in my office or jumping on couches. That doesn't bother me. I don't need silence. But I do need inner serenity.

I can't work from an outline--or only from the vaguest of outlines, perhaps two or three sentences at most about a chapter. It takes away the fun for me if I plan each detail. I seem to think better in bursts of creativity. I couldn't have an Even Day Bin and an Odd Day Bin, or anything that boxes me in.

I don't talk to my characters. They talk to me, sometimes. Or talk THROUGH me as voices. All of the techniques I see writers use like "interview my character" or whatever . . . they feel self-conscious and disrupt my process. I shudder even THINKING about using them. They feel false to me. And yet . . . gosh, I know tons of writers who use those techniques and love them.

I think anyone who tells you there is a right and wrong way to create a book is full of crap. Just as there is no right or wrong way to think, or have your Even/Odd Day bins.

Thoughts? How do YOU think? And how does it apply to how you WRITE?