the gnaw of inspiration amid checklists

31 Mar, 2025

reading: why fish don't exist by Lulu Miller

listening: I Love You, It's Cool by Bear in Heaven

The English language does not have a word for when the desire to create feels like it's going to chew its way out of your chest and throat. Some arrogant part of me feels compelled to coin one, but I won't attempt that here.¹

Right now, I'm sitting on nearly 30 pages of a thesis that I need to revise and complete. I also have another project due at the end of the semester, which I've submitted as a proposal to my instructor, but haven't gotten feedback for yet. I've got grading as well, plus meetings and shifts in the writing center, plus classes to teach and attend. My house is a mess. This summer, I'm moving. I haven't seen my friends outside of school in a while. My cat is doing better, but he's got a vet appointment. My therapist wants me to do homework relating to procrastination, of all things. Speaking of health, for the past three years plus I've been putting off my physical health something fierce. My back hurts. My neck is on a personal mission to kill me. Among all this, I still need to eat, sleep, drink, and shit. Oh, and fucking, but lord knows I've got no time for that, either!

It's during these times when I get these rapidfire bursts of inspiration. Boom boom boom, one after the other, I'll suddenly really want to draw, want to paint, want to whittle, want to write, want to carve or code or archive or compose or whatever. Sometimes I won't even have some idea of an actual picture to draw, but I'll just crave the feeling of the pen in my hand, the graphite on paper. Sometimes, I'll suddenly figure out some crucial missing piece of a project I've set aside, something that spurs me into a spiral of one plot beat to the next and the next. The images of what I want to be doing either physically with my body or imaginatively with a project are so clear, so crisp and real, but I can't--cannot--take the time to actually indulge.

This sensation hurts. Like, it physically hurts. You know the lump in your throat when you want to cry? Imagine that, but a harsh tickle, like when a cat grazes you with its teeth. Like there's some sort of sharp-toothed creature in you trying, literally, to eat its way out. And it hurts in the way masochistic sex hurts, because it feels good to be in this state of mind, especially when you've been in a dearth for a long time, but your release comes with caveats. The tyranny of time's passage tells you, "Not yet, dear" and as much as you'd like to beg to know when, then?! but you're bound and gagged.

A less graphic metaphor. You know when your throat is dry and parched, and that first sip of cool water stings, and your esophagus kind of constricts around it, so you really need to gulp that water down? And you have to keep drinking past the pain? Like that.

But I have all these items on my multiple checklists to attend to. And when I do get a moment, when I do get some time to myself, I'm recuperating. Or, worse, I'm procrastinating on something extremely timely, or I'm stuck in a "waiting room" sort of mood, and can only bring myself to waste time on micro tasks. Checking my email. Watching an idiotic video. Getting my updates. Never gathering the materials or mental peace I need to actually sit down and produce. And time slips away and leaves me in the sorriest state you can imagine.

The worst part of all of this? When I do have time--when summer arrives, or when I actually do have a day to rest--the drive goes away and leaves me unsatisfied. I hesitate to use the term "muse," because whatever this is is even crueler. A selfish lover who excites you and leaves just before release. A bite of ambrosia before you drop your plate to the floor.

So, that's where I'm at. Surrounded by to-do lists and tasks that I must accomplish. Projects that will make or break me. Chores that would make my life just a little easier when they're done, but that add up into something insurmountable very quickly when I put them aside. And the gnawing. The wanting. It doesn't stop.

At least writing this calmed some of its/my desire.

• Marc