A writer friend of mine told me a few days ago that I’m a storyteller and because of it, I must live in the eye of drama. While that thought gives scant comfort during all the crazy times clinging and oozing to my quest for serenity, it does make me smile. I use that “eye” when I write.

And what is writing anyways?

Like taking out your slide ruler when you spy a tornado or like working on convoluted calculus problem with the random factor being the human equation? Character A reacts to Situation B because of 2 parts (my own) personal experience, 1 part imagination, and a half part research.

Or is like pulling out your markers of the human condition and drawing a picture of swirling colors with the “eye” as your model?

I think it’s a little of both and more. If you have nothing to harvest, nothing to model, nothing to compare what do you have? You have imagination. And where does that come from? Okay, there’s research. And again, that comes from?

So, do I live in the eye of drama because I’m a storyteller or am I a storyteller because I live in the eye of drama? My friend’s entire line make existentialism whorl inside my brain. A healthier pasttime, I admit, than my “adversity builds character” quip and its counterquip “I’m character enough – much more and I’ll have to either charge admission or commit myself.”

Yes, I now have my own personal “which comes first the chicken or the egg” riddle. Do I write because I love stories or do I love stories because I write.

Did I mention writers are crazy?

Utterly unrelated, Rule Number 256: when leading a funeral as the clergy in charge don’t tell the mourners that the deceased MAY be in purgatory.  Besides being rude, it’ll make the mourners want to have some words with you.