Reflectivesurfaces's Blog

As I sit watching the cursor blink repeatedly back at me, I wonder what people did before that little black line was invented.  Watching it reminds me that I should be doing something in order for it to move along the page, preferably followed by text of a profound nature, but nope, that is too much to expect.   The best I can hope for is something that is legible, which should be a given, since it is not my penmanship in question.  The best I can hope for is that it flows in some sort of coherent, grammatically correct fashion.  The best I can hope for is that it contains some self-evident truth that calls to the reader and makes them stop for a moment and reflect on their own experiences and say:  “Yup, that is true.”  But I don’t think that is going to be the case today.

The biggest part of this experience is to face those moments when your brain is too slow to form a thought train that others wish to jump aboard to see where you are going.  Instead, it ends up a thought train that never left the station.  It just sits there, waiting for someone or something to conduct it.  An inert pile of black swiggles sitting on a white background.  But to face that moment when you wonder if you will ever have anything interesting to share with others and share with yourself can be a liberating experience.  You just let go of the control that permeates your every day life and lose yourself in the repetition of fingers pressing keys and see what your fingers allow to show up on that blank space.  Sometimes, it amazes you what appears on the page.  Sometimes, it embarrasses you and in very rare moments, it sometimes opens up a part of yourself that is hidden from the view of  others and even of yourself.

Is the experience of the cursor blinking back at you going to be open up a therapeutic moment, or a truth long denied, or simply be a waste of time for a reader outside your headspace?  It is that uncertainty that frightens others away from the release of the words that come from the fingertips.  After all, fingertips are a very long way from your head and your heart, but when the cursor blinks back at you, for an instant, it can all connect. 

But never forget, there is still a reason why it is called a cursor.  It calls to mind the mysticism of a curse.  It can draw you in or it can force you away.  There are 60 blinks for every minute, and I know that to be truth because I timed it.  A blink for every second of your life.  It is only when you are doing something that it is arrested in its function.  That function, to remind me that time is slipping away and I am doing nothing of value during that space of time can be a curse.  It mocks me.  It nags me.  It inspires me.  It angers me.  It reminds me.  It moves me.

And all it is a  little, blinking, black line on a white background.  So much power infused into it for such an insignificant thing.