Snorting Goats

Hello, my name is Heather Leigh, and I am an addict.

Okay, so I'm not making fun of the whole AA thing. Nothing cruel like that. But, what if the deep, ingrained desire to write was treated like an addiction? I mean, think about it. All the signs are there:
* Stories call out to me to be written
        --like the sirens from Homer's Odyssey--except that my sirens are elephants and leprechauns)
* I wake at night with plot ideas that won't let me sleep until they are written down
        --like all-nighters for barflies
* Smuggled in my purse is a writer's notebook, for quotes by friends and family
        --like a flask in a flasher's trench coat
* When in the writer's zone, I can't hear you
        --like an acid tripper dancing at a Rave Party

And what about my family and friends? If I'm in this deep, why have they not done an Intervention? It's because writing is socially acceptable. If they only knew that it really is just another form of madness, writers would be in straight jackets, unable to use pens or computers. Thank the God of Socially Accepted Addictions that normal people don't know the truth.

Okay, so this subject is completely different than the above stuff. But, how do goats walk in straight lines? Have you ever noticed their eye placement? They are seeing everything from how we see peripherally. It would be like trying to see your ears as you walk. Could you do it? I barely can. Does that mean goats are smarter than humans, or that they are more coordinated?

WARNING: Don't pretend to see like a goat while driving. Many good people have been killed by Goat Driving.

Okay, just one more completely different subject. What is it that makes parents want to bond with other parents by putting down their kids? If I had a quarter for every time a teacher strongly insinuated that my kid had some unique trait that was inexcusably horrid, I would have at least ten dollars by now. Maybe eleven. But the funny thing is, once I question the teacher as to what happened, turns out it was a bad day, a one-time thing, or a misunderstanding. And parents of teenagers? They are often worse than their kids--eye rolling and everything--about how 'teens are'. It's like us adults are all in on some anti-offspring cult. When I say I like my kids, and they aren't so bad, suddenly those adults agree with me. Weird, huh?

In order to wrap up this blog and bring the beginning into the ending, I'll go back to the first subject. Pretty smart, huh? I'm what's called a functioning writer.

There are many of us writers who carry around the Writer's Journal. BEWARE! It can be quite annoying to be stopped mid-conversation to have your witty, bittersweet, or clever saying written down. You are allowed to let the writer know before the chatting begins that you will not stand for interruptions. Kind of like telling a cocaine user to not snort at the kitchen table.

Heather Leigh,
writer addict with poor goat coordination