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Hairy Words

January 21, 2013 By Talya Tate Boerner 28 Comments

I have crazy psycho dreams. This, I’ve already confessed in prior posts.  Lately, my dreams have involved writing. Because.I’m.Obsessed. Possessed?

In my dreams, thoughts gush from the tip of my favorite pen, flowing and filling blank pages. In my dreams, I type fluently with fingertips on home keys, tap-tap-tap, as automatic as blinking. In my dreams, I edit, slash, replace, rack my brain for precise words that combine to form a magical sentence. Prose that flows likes a favorite melody. Words that sing.

In my most recent dream, I gazed into my mother’s magical magnifying mirror, the mirror she drags on every road trip. (The mirror that weighs fifteen pounds.) I discovered my eyebrows were unruly, in desperate need of plucking. A few wild stray hairs grew here and there, undetected by blurred fifty-year-old vision. Undetected without help from the hulking amplifier.

As I studied these shapeless brows, I noticed each hair was not a hair at all. Each hair was a word. A teeny-weeny minuscule group of letters. Why had I never noticed?

As I carefully tugged microscopic words from between my eyebrows, I wondered, did other people realized these hairs were adjectives and adverbs?
With my tweezers, I plucked…
very
          suddenly
      the
 small
                  important
           was
 just
               seem
   awesome…

Growing off to the side, I removed…
          interesting. 
Stray hairs. Stray words. 
When I finished, I admired my clean, evenly shaped eyebrows.
I’ve been writing word by word, bird by bird, bean by bean, hair by hair… I’ve been editing word by word, bird by bird, you get the picture.
Today, I shall take a break and go outside to play.
talya

Musical Pairing:

I Can See Clearly Now, Johnny Nash

“So the writer who breeds more words than he needs, is making a chore for the reader who reads.” 
― Dr. Seuss

Filed Under: Writing

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Comments

  1. Anonymous says

    January 21, 2013 at 7:15 am

    Yes, I think you need a day off. Go play. Sounds like you are about to lose it. Your Mom, B

    Reply
  2. Colene says

    January 21, 2013 at 7:59 am

    Go play! We can’t have you going around without any brows!

    Reply
  3. Kathy says

    January 21, 2013 at 8:44 am

    yeah, what Colene said! And speaking of 50-yar-old vision, I hope you read Luann in yesterday’s DMN comics! It speaks to the same …

    Reply
  4. Anonymous says

    January 21, 2013 at 2:56 pm

    Girl, I be liking the way you be thinking, another awesome one!

    Reply
  5. TimH says

    January 21, 2013 at 3:01 pm

    haha…Very cool…The part of your dream where you find words in your eyebrows would make a great Surrealist painting, entitled something like, I don’t know, “The Browzing Writer,” maybe?=) I have to admit that you do remind me of me in how I get obsessed with projects and how these obsessions tend to invade my dreams!=) And I’m no interpreter of dreams, but maybe you are obsessing over the pursuit of hirsute words when you should relax and just be your own wonderful self.=) With that said, I think this is an incredible piece of creative writing.

    Reply
  6. Anonymous says

    January 21, 2013 at 4:59 pm

    I agree Tim. theBAT

    Reply
  7. Patricia A. Laster says

    January 22, 2013 at 7:16 am

    I agree with Tim, too! PL

    Reply
  8. geezeronthego says

    January 22, 2013 at 6:25 pm

    Powerful and introspective entry, writers would do themselves a huge favor to read this multiple times.

    Reply
    • Talya Tate Boerner says

      January 22, 2013 at 6:37 pm

      Thank you:)

      Reply
    • Dorothy Latimer Johnson says

      January 24, 2013 at 1:41 pm

      This made me smile. You are so creative!

      Reply
  9. geezeronthego says

    January 22, 2013 at 6:29 pm

    Have you ever read Ken Rand’s The Ten Percent Solution?

    I think you would find it interesting.

    Reply
    • Talya Tate Boerner says

      January 22, 2013 at 6:37 pm

      Never heard of it but I’ll check it out.

      Reply
  10. drchoneydewcrm says

    February 4, 2013 at 11:49 am

    PLAY!!!!!!! SO SO CONCUR..do this EVERY day on my day off..and around the last hour of my 12 hr shift…its difficult to do in a trauma center, nevertheless..if its in your heart…it leaks out..like on this page..LOVE this BLOG! 🙂

    Reply
    • drchoneydewcrm says

      September 15, 2013 at 11:48 am

      Read this again…….and yes……. I LOVE YOUR PLAYING!! PLUCK ON!!! hehe yes i hear the music now!!!! ((hugs)) you must come visit me!!

      Reply
  11. Anne says

    February 8, 2013 at 5:47 am

    This was great insight, Talya. Now you can play 🙂

    Reply
  12. Joyce Lansky says

    February 9, 2013 at 10:52 am

    Stephen King said, “The road to hell is paved with adverbs.” Does that mean you had hell between your eyes?

    http://joycelansky.blogspot.com

    Reply
    • Talya Tate Boerner says

      September 18, 2013 at 4:42 pm

      Apparently so Joyce! And I agree with Mr. King.

      Reply
  13. beachlover says

    February 17, 2013 at 8:14 am

    Very, very cool blog! I love words!

    Reply
    • Talya Tate Boerner says

      September 18, 2013 at 4:42 pm

      Thank you!

      Reply
  14. Jo says

    September 15, 2013 at 12:11 pm

    The mind does baffle, if you’re a writer, at least! When all seems quiet and calm, suddenly characters erupt in my head and a story or a paragraph for the book, simply must be written!

    The random words, between the eyebrows, hmmmm, maybe just needed to written before your busy mind could let them rest.

    ❤

    Reply
    • Talya Tate Boerner says

      September 18, 2013 at 4:40 pm

      Yes even when we aren’t writing, we are writing in our heads.

      Reply
  15. Word Nerd says

    September 16, 2013 at 11:23 am

    Yes! Play! And always remain on the lookout for your words, because as you clearly know, those little suckers can be anywhere!

    Reply
    • Talya Tate Boerner says

      September 18, 2013 at 4:40 pm

      ha very true:))

      Reply
  16. Gary Henderson says

    September 18, 2013 at 1:12 pm

    I liked this one the first time around, and again now. 🙂

    Reply
    • Talya Tate Boerner says

      September 18, 2013 at 4:39 pm

      Thank you Gary!

      Reply
  17. Eccentricity says

    September 19, 2013 at 4:46 am

    Loved it. 🙂 Just like eyebrow maintenance, editing hurts but must be done. I recently posted a picture on my facebook that said “Don’t let anyone with bad eyebrows tell you sh*t about life”. Lol! Clean eyebrows, good editing…essential. 😉

    Reply
    • Talya Tate Boerner says

      September 19, 2013 at 5:34 am

      Thank you – love your facebook picture:))

      Reply
  18. beachlover says

    September 23, 2013 at 10:05 am

    Still funny the second time I read this! I have the weirdest dreams too… 🙂

    Reply

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Talya Tate Boerner


Hi! I'm Talya. Writer, Reader, Arkansas Master Naturalist / Master Gardener, Author of

THE ACCIDENTAL SALVATION OF GRACIE LEE (2016)

GENE, EVERYWHERE: a life-changing visit from my father-in-law (2020)

BERNICE RUNS AWAY (Now Available!)

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