Writing

My dry spell in writing continues. Ever since the death of my partner, Su, at the end of March, I’ve been stymied. I’ve tried multiple times to continue with the novel I was writing based on our relationship, but words won’t come.

Instead, I find myself sitting at the keyboard and remembering—how much she enjoyed the steak dinners with elaborate desserts that I fixed for her once a week, how I cleaned house before she came over, how she telephoned me every day at eight in the morning and again at eight at night. We always sat out on my deck, weather permitting, and drank in the beauty of nature before us. She claimed the hall bathroom as her own, and kept her cosmetics and lotions there. I always saw to it that the towels and face cloths there were fresh and clean.

Now the steaks I bought for her sit unused in my freezer. The ice cream, chocolate sauce, and whipped cream have been in my refrigerator so long I don’t know if they’re still edible. The house gets dirty and stays that way—no one to see it but me. I find myself waiting for the eight o’clock phone calls, then remember . . . It’s too cold to sit out on the deck, and the linen in the hall bathroom remains unused.

I have all the raw material to write our story, but I can’t do it. Someday soon, I’ll try writing a story about something else. But so far, no other story comes into my mind.

Someday. Not now.