The company we keep.

Remember learning about Shelley (both Mary Wollstonecraft and Percy Bysshe) and Byron and whoever else, spending their summers together in Coastal England and writing and writing and writing?

How did they do that? (Well, okay, I think they smoked a fair amount of dope. Although I may have just made that up; sometimes I do that.)

What I mean is, how could all those writers hang out together? And artists, too, right?

It's not for me. I have friends who are writers. When we get together, we do not have writing contests, or talk about writing, or do any of the things we learned that the Shelleys and Lord Byron did in order to get the creative juices flowing.

(I'm almost certain I did not make up the dope-smoking part. I think there was even a movie about it. The word "summer" was in the title. I'm trying really hard not to look it up, though. I think it's better for my brain if I can remember.)

Maybe it's just me. Maybe I'm selfish or jealous or something. That could be. I'd rather keep my writing time for myself. It's therapeutic. Like this. What would I be doing if I weren't writing in my journal in this moment? Probably laundry. And that's no good.

Of course, I have a few, long-suffering friends who are subjected to occasional e-mails along the lines of, "Check this out. It's my favorite sentence right now." Followed by a sentence which may or may not make it into the final version of whatever I'm doing.

My poor friends. I don't know how they put up with me. I don't think I would put up with me.

(I caved. The movie was called Haunted Summer, made in 1988. There was also one called Gothic, made in 1986. Each one suggests that the three writers were up to some mighty un-Victorian-like shenanigans. Well, depending on what you believe about that era.)