Writing is important
Sometimes I lose faith in writing.
It’s just words. Letters in different combinations.
And sentences. Words in different combinations.
And paragraphs. Sentences in different combinations.
Why do I spend so much time obsessing over reordering these combinations?
Then my girlfriend shows me her phone screen.
She’s trying to show me the time.
But my eyes gravitate to the Spotify app on the lock screen.
It shows that “Dance Yrself Clean” by LCD Soundsystem is playing in her headphones.
So I start thinking …
What does that mean?
Dance yourself clean?
Does that mean you’re addicted to drugs and you need to get clean, so you dance to get clean?
Is it deeper than that?
Like you’re dirty in another sense and dancing makes you clean somehow?
Should I be dancing myself clean?
I haven’t gone dancing in a while.
Maybe I should go dancing.
All of that … from three words!
Dance.
Yourself.
Clean.
Three words I’ve encountered individually probably ten thousand times each (maybe more).
But when combined. In that specific order.
My mental gears start turning. New synapses connect in my brain. I start to form ideas, feel things. Get inspired. Make plans.
Three words.
There are only 26 letters in the English alphabet.
There are 676 permutations of two letters (not all of which are words, but many of them are).
17,576 permutations of three letters.
456,976 permutations of four letters.
And increasingly more permutations for longer words.
Not all of the permutations are words.
Of those that are words, they’ve all been used. If it’s a word, it has to have been used at least once.
But the number of permutations increases for combinations of words, sentences, paragraphs.
Of these, there may be permutations that have never been written.
Or permutations that were written, but it was the wrong time. Too early or too late.
Wrong audience. Wrong place.
A lit match goes out when dropped in a puddle of water.
But a lit match dropped in a pile of hay, in a barn, in a wooden town …
Words inspire thought.
Thoughts inspire action.
Writing can change everything.
Writing is important.