Imagination

When I was growing up, I thought briefly about becoming a writer, but ultimately decided that because I wasn’t interested in getting into bar fights or running with the bulls, I would never make it. So, at the tender age of seven or eight, I put that dream aside and shortly thereafter was bit by the archaeology bug. I think about that now, and I’m struck by two things: one is how pervasive the idea of the Hemingway-esque writer must be in American culture for a kid to imagine that’s what writers did (it would be years until I got another glimpse of the writing life, courtesy of Louisa May Alcott and Jo March). The other is that I also put the idea of writing aside because I was pretty sure I had no imagination.

Never mind that archaeologists make a habit of reconstructing lives from trash, walking around in the shoes of people who’ve been dead for hundreds or thousands or tens of thousands of years. That’s just speculation, based on hard data, right?

I still get anxious considering the notion of imagination. But after having written six or seven novels, I’m quite clear on the fact that I’m not writing biography or field reports, so something else must be going on. About a month ago, I got my first insight into what imagination might be, not grand inspirations from on high, not a divine gift, not the touch of the Muse (pick a Muse, any muse). I think that it might be this: not squelching the notions that first pop into your head.

Walking down my street that day, I happened to notice what looked like a chunk of human skull perched on a rock outcrop. My first thought was, jeez, whoever that belonged to had a head the size of a watermelon! Then my second thought was, okay, how did that chunk of skull get there? And it’s kinda flat to be a cranium. Then, oh, it’s a dried out piece of pumpkin, left here from last Halloween’s ritual smashing fest . Then finally, stupid. Isn’t it of course more likely that it wasn’t a human skull, that it was a piece of bark or pumpkin?

Well, yeah, more likely. But what if—?

And that’s when it struck me. It’s far more interesting if it’s a human skull, far more interesting to ask how it might have gotten there, why has no one noticed it, etc. It’s going with that first weird thought and not censoring your questions about it, or your responses to it, at least not until you’re at the editing stage. Just don’t trample the odd way you happen to see things at first, don’t squelch that inspiration. There’ll be plenty of time for logic later.