Doe, a Dear

As my post on Remembrance is pushed off the page, I have placed another piece of music on the left. Those who know my musical tastes know that I love medleys – playing them, making them, and listening to them. Well, this piece is not really a medley in the regular sense; it's more like variations on the spiritual/folk/campfire song, Kum Ba Yah (or Kumbaya), played in the setting of some of the more inspiring music of our time.

Finding inspiration can often be a difficult task; certain things require a certain mood, a specific place, a particular person – to get the ink flowing, to start the music playing. Used in psychological development as well as in writing practices, a common technique is free, or continuous, writing. This is when you have a pencil in hand, paper in front – and you write and write and write – non-stop. There is no need for corrections, only a need to fill up space, as the writer may stray off topic as much as they wish. If you can't think of anything, then write about how you can't think of anything, until something comes along.

It is a good practice. Personally, I have adapted this technique for the piano as well – usually when I find myself most stressed, or perhaps I just need to take a break from calculus (likely 'cause its stressful). To sit down on the bench and play. And play and play and play. To keep the fingers dancing, the notes flowing – until I feel ready to start differentiating again, or until my sister yells down the stairs, "It's midnight, stop playing, I need to sleep!" … it's quite often the latter.

But even in this free thought – unbound to direction – anything from Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D-minor to Hammerstein's The Sound of Music, from this note to articles submitted to local magazines; thoughts need to be inspired. To everyone, this is different. However, I would like to share a passage from an analysis for specific personality types that I have indicated beforehand. I don't think I have anything to hide here – I'm classified as an INFJ (Introversion, iNtuition, Feeling, Judging).

"INFJs may be attracted to writing as a profession, and often they use language which contains an unusual degree of imagery. They are masters of the metaphor, and both their verbal and written communications tend to be elegant and complex. Their great talent for language usually is directed toward people, describing people and writing to communicate with people in a personalized way. INFJs who write comment often that they write with a particular person in mind; writing to a faceless, abstract audience leaves them uninspired."

I have to strongly agree with that last point. I find the target audience to be extremely crucial to anything I write, and the following is a passage from an article written last year for the Together, the local newsletter for the Taiwanese Canadian Association in Toronto:

"In the bliss of summer vacation, writing an article certainly brings back school memories. While reminiscing, my creepy English teacher whispers into my ear, "When writing, always consider your target audience." I realized that this article, along with my last article, targets the next generation – and chances are, that if you are a Canadian born Taiwanese, you didn't pick this up on your own. In fact, chances are that you're either: A) 1st generation Taiwanese, wondering why Together would include such a poorly structured article, or B) the next generation, holding this in your hand, because I told your parents to pass my message on."

Even to the extent of the above article – I did have a specific person, or a handful of people in mind when I wrote this. And when I do write – whether an email or these blog posts that are seriously just too long, there is often someone there. Truth be told, it's often a different person, perhaps maybe seen in my change of tone for many of these posts, but I would like you to know, that as my fingers dance across these keys, whether the plastic ones that click-clack away as I type, or those 88 keys that are ever so inviting at 1:52 am, this really is often, inspired by you – hence these five syllables that govern this page.

I hope I can inspire you to write as well – I love to read just as much as I love to write – and to quote The Sound of Music, "Let's start at the very beginning / A very good place to start". And when writing to a particular person in mind – whether or not it is physically written onto the paper, there's often a whisper of, "Dear ____"…

And from the very start, I begin with that blank sheet of paper or that silent room, and from that first C-chord that starts off Let it Be, to that final "do[e]" that concludes What a Wonderful World, the inspiration sings throughout. And to whoever this may concern – from that day I said this was Yet.to.be.Titled – I've given it a name =).