Kathmandude's Post: From Writer’s Block to Writer’s Cramp

[Blogger Kathmandude was recently diagnosed with writer's cramp. Well, if you don't know what that is, don't worry, you are not alone. Basically, writer's cramp is a form of focal dystonia; the word focal pertaining to particular location in your body, in this case, the hand. The hand basically cramps every time you try to write (yeah, sucks). For an avid writer like our in house guest blogger, this is grave news]

Ref: explosm.net

I never really grasped the idea of writer’s block until it happened to me. Well, now that I think about it, I still don’t believe it. It’s like one of those delirious moment in time after doing some weed and one gets paranoid at almost everything that is in the milieu. And after a respiting slumber, one then wakes up to find everything is fine and think maybe that moment was only a bad dream. So, when writer’s block starts to kick in then one knows that it is almost hopeless to even cling on to random scribbling or some idea one may be interested to explore through writing. There’s absolutely nothing that one can do to bring one’s mind, down from the grave.  All one does is wait for the brain to recollect, restore and re-invent your ideas and put it methodically for one to replay in mind or even pursue it. To be honest, I still don’t know what I suffer from. Is it really a writer’s block or a mere fancy on boredom. Our mind percolates stress and anxiousness in mysterious ways to keep us happy. Both ways, it’s a vacation for creativity. 

Now, what I don’t understand is how this writer’s cramp works. It’s not even been a week of being diagnosed as a writer’s cramp and so it was a damned cramp. I was better off not knowing about it, to be frank. I am the latest and naïve owner of this affliction. I was in shock at the onset but I regained myself to try understand this condition which I absolutely abhor. Sometimes, I think, it’s too dull to be human. And my mind creeps up with weird and mundane ideas. As if I don’t have eccentric friends.  People have cancer, typhoid, Ebola, common cold or diarrhea. And here I am the one who thought the most serious or (to be more serious) life threatening disease was chicken pox! That too, but that was way back in my childhood. And now I have this permanent affliction. I am just plainly pissed that I will never have a good, or even a decent handwriting for the rest of my life.  

It’s very funny actually. I mean, so what? Who needs crafty penmanship in today’s world. It’s a farce, writing with pen and pencils. One may even be found to be repulsive, to be caught writing with such crafty tools and could be branded as a hipster. But I need my decent handwriting back. I don’t like the whole idea of me not being in control of my hands and fingers while writing. In common parlance, I don’t want to feel inferior to myself. I not a big fan of fate and I believe I should be in control over my own self, not fate.  And suddenly, now I know that I am in control of fate.  I had read about how in the Second World War, the solders would suddenly have a case of paralysed leg or arm. If they were to march forward, they were almost sure of Nazi bullets and if they tried to camouflage their way out, they would be court marshalled. So, what the brain did was, it paralysed them on some part of their body, mostly hands and limbs, for some hours or even days, so as to escape these ghastly experiences. And off they were to hospitals for treatment. There’s no organic symptom for it. The anxieties and fear is converted into a physical form. It’s called Conversion Disorder. Well, what’s one to do when the mind creates such melodramatic coping mechanisms.

Now this is the same brain system that has been pissing me off. What makes me feel repulsed by it, is that I should be in the control of myself, not these rebel nerves who dare to impose such an impish affliction, a focal dystonia, upon me. It’s really going to be hard on anyone who knows that s/he can give an order to his/her hand and that hand will, without hesitation or grumble, do the work sincerely. But when it comes to holding a pen, one cannot simply stand to admire the lack of authority that the brain has over the hand. This rebellion is depressing.

This is just sad.

One can observe that there’s a certain charisma about freedom that appeals to people who are struck in the average hierarchy of everything. An average height, average looks, average health, average class, even, average badass, and you name it. There’s a thin line discerning what is average and what is poor. So, these average denizens of social order have been conditioned, since the childhood, to get what want and what they want is neither mendicant nor superfluously opulent. So, these prudent people value freedom more than anything.  They have tasted a wee bit of soil here and wee bit of flower there. Only, these are the people who achieve ethereal satisfaction which is derived from freedom.  So, this gratification of volition is what I yearn for, in this suffering, working class freedom, this unwavering and coveted faith in myself to crush these rebels.  Such blissful freedom I desire to attain.  Such a horrible plight, little specks of universe colliding against each other and creating a chaos in one’s soul. Freedom is a spiteful concept for those who pursue it and can’t have it. I am spiteful nowadays, to those who can casually do what I cannot do, against anyone who remarks over my affliction not knowing what anguish lies below the counterpane of a faint smile. And against the backdrop of a silly background which trembles and itches to be free of this monster which is taking my calm slowly, like a bad poison, which simply doesn’t kill even when you pledge for an end to this comedy of errors.

It’s the little things in life that kill a person. The cycle of love and hate with one’s illness. I don’t know if it’s an illness of some sort. Sometimes I cannot stop but admire this misery and feel warmth, knowing that it is not me and something else in my own self that is revealing itself. It gives a feeling to me that I am not alone within. There’s a companion within me that tries to get my attention and it has found a way to get one. And sometimes I wonder, maybe just like writer’s block, writer’s cramp too is exclusively cognitive.  Or maybe both exists not.