I now have a much deeper understanding of the term “writer’s block.” Or at least a different one. Yeah, it’s probably just different. I used to think writer’s block was when a person couldn’t think of anything to write. The ideas were blocked by something, much like a 40-year old man trying to get an autograph from Taylor Swift. And maybe that’s still what it really means. But I think I’m suffering from writer’s blockage, a younger, oft-confused cousin of writer’s block.

Writer’s blockage is when there is something clogging the pipes of productivity. It can be many things: tearing out the mold in the basement, learning the chord progression to Allentown, Netflix original series. My current blockage is this mammoth of a 75-page manuscript I’m supposed to get published in May. I’m supposed to have this thing written/proofread/edited/rewritten/reproofread/turned inside-out/glued together/designed/formatted by the first week of February. How far I’ve gotten is irrelevant. The fact that it exists is clogging up the pipes so nothing else can get through. It is possible that I could move this huge clog to let a few other things squeeze by, but that’s a messy and counterintuitive undertaking. I’d probably be better served to chop it up into parts to get them through the drain a little bit at a time. But some days it’s just easier to watch reruns of Monk. And this is why I haven’t updated this website in way too long. Nothing can get through.

Or writer’s blockade, if you’d rather, where streets are blocked for miles and hours and no traffic can get in until the stupid parade finishes its procession down Creative Way, onto Edited Boulevard and finally collects in the parking lot of Manuscripts R Us (for better or worse), where the floats can finally be disassembled and people can get on their way to the Blog Post Office again. Or something like that. Ideas aren’t the problem. I can see them across the street, eager to get on with their drives and frustrated with the traffic. Sometimes they turn around and I don’t see them for a bit and they try another street with similar futile results. But mostly, they’re just sitting there waiting for the parade to end, so that the engine doesn’t lock up. And once in a while, a small moped, not unlike this one, will break through the blockade and crash the party. And when that happens, I’ll be sure to post. But for the next few months, the parade I’ve spent four years preparing for takes precedence.

That and the NFL playoffs.