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Zeldman has a new article up on writing: Write When Inspired. The mantra: “Write when inspired; rest when tired.” Memorable enough. And popular enough if you read the article’s comments. A few dissenters raise their heads. Not enough do, likely because if you did: fail. A person could ruin their career with one poorly placed comment on Zeldman’s blog. Here’s the comment I left, and it was stolen from Jack London:

“Don’t loaf and invite inspiration; light out after it with a club, and if you don’t get it you will nonetheless get something that looks remarkably like it.” -Jack London

If you wait to write when inspired, well, you’ll spend time waiting. Why not write while waiting? Makes the waiting less boring.

In short: I read, I disagreed, I was inspired to disagree and that inspiration almost led to a longer mistake than the one quote. He didn’t mean what he was saying, or what I thought he was saying in the mnemonic about inspiration:

“Sorry, perhaps I should have stated explicitly at the top that orderly work habits are a given. I don’t mean sit around for weeks waiting for lightning to strike.”

I’ll admit that’s how I read his article: the simple mnemonic shaped how I read the rest. My brain threw in an “only.” Write “only” when inspired. In his defense, that was my “only” and the phrase oversimplifies what he understands to be more complex. His comments evince that. Part of my misunderstanding could have been that I’m not a thoughtful reader. He writes for a certain kind of reader, the one with orderly work habits and one who is thoughtful and drinks up words: “I write for a thoughtful reader, who reads at moderate speed, drinking in the words and getting what is said and what doesn’t need to be said.” I read that and I said to myself: Whu-whu-what? Senator, you’re no John Keats. Your rifts are missing some ore. But whoa, Jody, whoa …

Let’s roll back the clock, roll back the clock on my misunderstanding and let’s extrapolate unhelpfully. I think, or I hypothesize, or I guess that something similar happened to Zeldman: he was inspired to write about the mnemonic, like I was inspired to write about my misunderstanding, and then he didn’t get the words out right, like I’m likely doing now. He meant a certain type of writer and he was writing for a certain type for reader, things the post itself don’t make explicit. A re-read and revision might have told him: if we write for readers (”You are writing for readers, a duty as sacred, in its way, as parenting”), he’d know all readers don’t or can’t have orderly work habits (what does “orderly” mean in this context? I have method to my madness), and he’d know all readers don’t drink in words (a metaphor used in religious writings–from Tibetan texts to Jonathan Edwards descriptions of congregations). I drink in Wallace Stevens, Kurt Vonnegut, Richard Ellman. But, I’m not sure I really drink them. I read them.

I can say this: Zeldman’s article inspired me to write and I’m not in the writing mood. I’m not going to do my best work in this post because, well, Zeldman is right: “we do our best work when healthy, rested, refreshed, alert, and eager to do the job for its own sake.” Yet how often are we healthy, rested, refreshed, alert and eager–all at once? That’s a rhetorical question which probably says more about me than it should. I’m charging ahead anyway, health and rest and refreshment be damned.

Whatever the case, thanks to Zeldman I was inspired and I wrote.

Tangent 1: In a fit of bigheadedness, I noticed validation errors on his site a while ago and twittered about it. I hope he didn’t think it was “catching him in a mistake.” I can only hope enough people care about my code to validate it for me.

Tanget 2: Damn it. I forgot the inverted pyramid (see the Web Style Guide and Nielson’s site). Given that pyramid I wouldn’t have placed a mnemonic like that at the beginning. But what do I know? I’ve only been writing since … longer than I’ll admit and I have fewer Amazon entries than Zeldman. I wouldn’t have used a mnemonic either. But mnemonics are useful. Sometimes.