Empty Head

It's funny. I am sitting in front of a computer screen and my head is empty. It's the craziest thing. I can lie in bed for hours, after midnight, and have thoughts pouring through my mind. I'm not even sure I always understand it. Sometimes, I lie awake worried about how something will turn out. Sometimes, I turn a particular problem over in my head ad nauseum.

More often than not, I'm just not sleepy. I have taken a nap that was too late or too long. I didn't get enough to eat or I worked out too close to bedtime. I'm enjoying the quiet, I'm staring at the Scrabble board, I'm watching the minutes ebb away at my available sleep.

Now, though, when I want to be writing, I have no thoughts. I wrote part of an entry and scrapped it because it sounded like a commercial. I was going to write about Jeremy and I decided I didn't have enough to say.

It's tough, as a mom, to try and tap into a creative vein at will. There is certainly enough in my day that tickles my creativity. I have to solve my son's toilet paper problem, for example. I don't know why, but he insists on using almost an entire roll of toilet paper every time he uses the bathroom.

It would seem like the easy thing to do would be to put the toilet paper out of his reach. Unfortunately, there's no place that's out of his reach. I have tried to force him to go to the bathroom nearby, so that I don't have to run up (or down) to a flooding toilet.

Earlier today, he entered our 4th bedroom (which we use as an office) and unceremoniously plopped the plunger onto the carpet runner. "Mommy, can you please come downstairs and unplug the toilet?" He was at it again.

So there's a lot of opportunity to think creatively, but inspiration doesn't always strike when I want it to. Now, if you'll excuse me....my empty head needs to lie down on the pillow. I'm assuming an idea will strike in the next half hour.