Fear of the Blank Page

It’s a common observation for a lot of writers to stare into the emptiness of a fresh sheet of paper, and feel that momentary prick of terror: will I fill this? Will the words appear? Or, worse yet, will the page be filled, but with utter crap? I know this fear pretty well. It’s not really papyrophobia, and not really hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia, and maybe it’s a form of agoraphobia, but all in total it feels like a decidedly tangible intangible.

There was a brief time in my college years where I flirted with the notion of acting. I even got the lead in a community performance of “Bell, Book and Candle”, and regardless of how many weeks the show ran, there was a moment each night where I stood behind the door facade and waited for my queue where I felt the stark panic of “oh my god, what’s my line?”

I think I actually did forget the line once, but other than that, the words fell out each time the door opened. It felt a bit more like skydiving (I assume), because all too often I was mostly just hanging on for dear life and praying that I wouldn’t screw up the show for the rest of the cast or the director. It was sheer terror each night, but I just kept coming back and strapping in for each performance. We all have our adrenaline rushes, maybe. Getting up on stage has always been that for me, whether as an actor, a musician, or, now, as a writer.

But that’s a rush I have had decades to appreciate, and savor the thrill like a finely aged whiskey. It’s got a kick, followed by that warm glow that reaches down to toes and fingertips; a familiar sensation that triggers all manner of emotions and memories.

That, however, is a different sort of emotional ride than the blank page. Every time I sit down to write, I feel that familiar pang of dread that threatens to throw me off my storytelling and bury myself in a book, a video game, a rerun on Disney+, whatever the case may be. It happens to me, and I know it happens to many of you as well. The blank page tries to taunt me, like the French knights at the top of the towers in Monty Python. It would definitely catapult cows at me if they had the stock to spare, that’s for certain. And since I’m fresh out of large wooden badgers, I don’t usually know quite how to respond.

One day, though, it hit me.

It’s not a blank page. It’s not destined to be a permanently immovable void, free from letters and sentences and stories. It’s not a fixed point. It just is not that.

The page is an untraveled road, stretching out to the horizon. It is an uncharted ocean. Pristine and freshly fallen snow, wishing for snow angels and witty snowmen (or snow people - my fields are free from gender expectations). My pages are the sky, and those clouds can look like bunny rabbits or steam-powered airships if I think they do, right?

I can remember starting on “Reaper’s Return”, lo those many years ago. The concept seemed monumental. A book about an 11 year old girl who becomes an angel of death? Ridiculous! And the full series - six books?? What was I thinking? And short stories? Collections? Stories about a dark Peter Pan? A robot apocalypse emerging from customer service and live robot music? More novels in the Reaper’s Return universe? Seriously, if I were a sane human, I’d never have even started that nonsense, right?

But, yeah, I guess it’s good that I didn’t opt for reason. That’s how new things get made, you know? Getting off the road and making your own path, building on the wisdom of those who went before and putting your personal spin on it. At this point, I can look back on the million or so words I’ve put on pages, and at least extrapolate that maybe I can keep filling up more of these endlessly vacant spaces with more ideas and new stories. I’ve got a few new additions to my “to do” list, some of which I’m already working on, but several that remain in the “next on deck” folder.

So, what about you? What are you working on? What project do you think is an insurmountable opposition? An unclimbable mountain? An unstoppable force?

Because I’ve got news for you: you - YOU - are the unstoppable force. You are the insurmountable opposition. You are the mountain. You are the ocean.

You are the open road, and the horizon is right there, just off in the distance. Can you see it? Can you feel that sun and breeze upon your face? Can you count the stars? Can you make the snow angels?

Of course you can.

We all can.

So what are you waiting for?