The Writer’s Pea

Do you remember the story of Hans Christian Andersen’s The Princess and the Pea, immortalized in the musical “Once Upon a Mattress”? The evil queen — a staple of fairy tales — gives Winnifred a test to see if she’s sensitive enough to marry the prince. The test: Will placing a pea under a stack of mattresses prevent Winnifred from falling asleep?

Of course, we all know how it works in fairy tales. Winnifred — the feisty, unrefined heroine (fairy tale staple #2) — becomes a raging insomniac, all because of a stupid vegetable. And in the end, the evil queen is proven wrong (fairy tale staple #3 in this scenario). 

I thought of this story — sadly I can identify with the raging insomniac part — when I tried to come up with a reason for explaining why I have not been writing in this space for the past month or so.

It’s not like I haven’t had ideas. Most of this blog is writing about our family, and there’s no shortage of material there. And even though our schedules have been jammed, it’s not like I haven’t had a few sleepless nights to work on things.

But every time I’ve started, I’ve stopped for some reason, so my desktop is cluttered with a series of half-formed ideas for essays that are still marinating in my brain. This explanation is my way of trying to get back in the groove — “The Father’s New Groove,” now that’s an idea for a fairy tale.

The best way I can describe it is that I’ve had the “writer’s pea.” I hope that I’ve managed to now remove it successfully, and that, having relaxed and done something productive, that we can now return to our semi-regularly scheduled programming.

Back soon, I promise. Thanks for indulging me.