My internal novelist

I don't know about y'all, but I think I spend at least half of my time composing narrations in my head. Seriously.

I don't know if it's the constant blogging, or lack of other creative outlets, but writing has become the foremost activity for my brain. My brain narrates my way through my day. At night, often, I lay awake replaying the events from earlier. The audio and video from the day do not stream through my memory bank in the manner I imagine it does for most people when recounting a day's events. Instead, the trappings of my day are replayed behind closed eyelids, accompanied by what I imagine I'd be typing to go along with them. I assume most people have an internal dialogue when in deep thought, but I feel my brain takes it a few steps further than most minds would. Instead of merely recounting my memories, I compose unwritten vignettes and contemplate which point of view would be more reader-friendly. I find myself striking through wordings; using alternate words to make my vocabulary seem expansive my internal thesaurus always on standby.

Take today for example. I was at Wholesome Living Guru's house for a little get together with one other friend. I've already hyper-developed this lady's character in a previous (aforelinked) post. As we sat with coffee and watched our children play, I was internally satirizing the whole scene.

So, I wonder, if I'm using my entire life as blog fodder and making archetypes of my friends, is it fair? I wonder how many writers have lost friends or loved ones to a little world they create all on their own. Don't know what I mean? Well let me explain...

If I didn't have this little blog of mine, I wonder if I'd still hold strong some of my best kept feelings toward people. I mean, if I didn't have my blog, Wholesome Living Guru would not be immortalized as such. She'd just be another friend who has some eccentricities regarding feeding her children. But instead, she is, in my mind, a highly developed character...complete with italicized name. But does that character impede my judgment regarding my personal thoughts that surround this person? I mean, If I go around developing everyone into a hyper-acute version of them self, am I doing a disservice to them? Or am I just doing what every other writer does? Is it fair?

This problem reaches into other areas of my life as well. The other night I was having problems sleeping. I couldn't wind down. I had to take anxiety medication just to hush the narrator in my head who kept going over everything that had happened to me that day and trivializing what words I'd use to describe which event. My husband wanted to make love to me...I couldn't get in the mood. Why? Because apparently I have a novella pushing on the innards of my skull.

This is a real problem for me, mostly because what I compose in my head never makes it to the keyboard.

I wonder if they make internal thought recording devices.