Surrounded By Words....

As I punch in the letters on my keyboard, I am reminded how much words surround me. They fly around my head, they come out from my fingers and they make up a significant portion of all the things that have ever impacted me.

I'm sitting in the city library on a sweltering hot summers day, feeling extremely content with life. There's so much to be thankful for right here - namely the air conditioning, and for the free internet (my modems still on it's way, so desperate times call for the uses of public facilities! Thanks City Council!). So finally, after a good month and a half of near-silence, I finally get to write again.

It's not that I have been absent from the way of the pen. In fact, there has been many things to write about, probably more than ever. My mind is filled to the brim with words, words which are almost overflowing the top of my head and dying to get on paper.
Or webpages.

And yet, in the library, all I can think of is books.

It's kind of self-explanatory. After all, this is a library, the third home of books after a printing press and a bookstore. So really it is no wonder. There's even one sitting on the table in front of me, a particular novel entitled "Dust".

Funny how I came to the library primarily to use the public facilities of free internet and air con, and yet I still can't resist picking up at least one book.

I believe one of my favorite author's, Terry Prachett was correct when he said (to the effect of) "Books are dangerous. That's why the ones at the [Unseen Univsity] library had to be chained down..." It seems a strange idea that mere writings on paper can be considered dangerous. How much harm can a book do? (Unless it's a very voluminous dictionary which someone happened to throw at you).

But stop and think about it.

I can honestly say that, besides conversation/speaking and music, out of all the things in life which have impacted me the most, it would be books. Sure movies, plays, and websites all have their own ways and means of making you think (some better than others). Yet books seem to do something to you. They can twist your insides out, and make you wonder about a particular idea for days, sometimes even weeks. The way they subtly suggest things, or even make you suggest them yourself rather than plainly stating facts, is an area which has always fascinated me.

I guess maybe that's why I want to be a writer.

Here I sit surrounded by words, just trying to add my own to the masses....