I can’t keep my mouth shut.  In school I was the kid the teacher always moved around, hoping to find a spot where I couldn’t (or wouldn’t) talk to a classmate.  With me it never happened.  I talked to everybody.  My mother used to tell me, “Don’t tell everybody everything you know, or they’ll be as smart as you are.”  I didn’t care.  I figured they’d always know where they learned it.

            So when I found myself divorced, with the children out of the nest, and living alone, all I had to talk to was the cat.  At first there was just the one that I took custody of in the divorce.  Now I have three cats and two dogs.  There is plenty of conversation, but I know deep down that all they hear is “Blah, blah, blah, good dog (or cat) blah, blah, Maddy ( or J.T., or Little Bit…).”  Somehow, that is not very satisfying.  I need feedback.  In English.

            Talking to people at work involves – work.  That’s no fun.  And getting too personal with your co-workers just doesn’t work out - there are some things you just don't want to know.  Eventually there are differences of opinion or worse, and then it makes the work environment a little stressed.  So that leaves your family. 
           When you live by yourself, the times that you get together with your family become conversational oases and you can get carried away.  When I visit my parents, my mom and I talk non-stop for the first day and my dad sits and watches us, shaking his head.  When my daughter and I visit, I find that I talk, she listens.  Then I feel bad when the visit is over, realizing that all I do is chatter, and I resolve to improve the next time we are together.  Even strangers -  people who come to work on the house and clerks at stores- are beginning to avoid me…

            So, when I discovered a writers’ group, the other little thing my Mother said to me jumped into my head – “ You should write a book.”

            A book, heck!  I wrote essays, newspaper articles, letters to the editor, poems, short stories, and yes, finally, even started a few books. With the writers’ group I have a captive audience.  I write the assignments, and then when it comes time to share them, they have to listen.  And I get to tell lies!  Let’s face it, short stories, novels, and even poems don’t have to be true.  I can make up anything I want. 

            The best part?  I’m actually pretty good at it!  It turns out - go figure - that I can win contests and get published.  Somebody actually reads, and likes, what I write.

            There isn’t anything I don’t put on paper.  If there’s a word, there’s a way to use it.   I make notes to myself, subjects  and titles for poems and stories, and lists - things to write, chores that need to be done, shopping lists, home improvement projects, wish lists  - see? Even this is a list.  My son finds lists all over the house when he visits and points out that I have several with the same thing on them.  You see, I’m not very organized, and I lose them, so I just make new ones.  More writing!

So.  Why do I write?  I write because those words have to go somewhere.  It’s not quite the same as conversation, but on the bright side, my voice doesn’t get hoarse, and my fingers never get sore (aren’t computer keyboards wonderful? No pressure at all.).  Now and then I get to read my writing aloud to someone, or to talk to a group about the pleasure of the written word, so that satisfies the other reason.

I can’t keep my mouth shut!