An introduction to an idea of best moments

Okay, so here’s the deal. I finished reading Nicholson Baker’s The Anthologist, and in addition to being one of the best novels I’ve read in a long while, it gave me a great idea about how I can raise a toddler and still keep this blog alive. When asked how he achieves the presence of mind to write poetry, the narrator replies:

"'I ask a simple question. I ask myself: What was the very best moment of your day?' The wonder of it was, I told them, that this one question could lift out from my life exactly what I will want to write a poem about. Something that I hadn’t known was important will leap up and hover there in front of me, saying I am – I am the best moment of the day."

He goes on for a while, but in those few sentences, I was already a convert. I know that a blog isn’t poetry, or even prose, but if you look back in your archives, you’ll see that on any given day, your writing often depends on the lifting of these best moments.

My day has only just started, and not very well, but I will write down my best moment from yesterday so that you can see that I’m committed to doing this...

Wait - I haven’t told you what I’m doing yet!

Okay, so I plan to write down the best moment of my day, in whatever shape it takes. That’s it. Simple, right? It will allow me to keep up my end of the bargain (i.e. – I write a post, you read a post) without compromising too much of our precious time on this earth.

I hope you enjoy reading about these moments as much as I enjoy remembering them.

23.09.2010

It was four o’clock and I’d just finished my painting lesson. The pink stucco house across the street had a bit of the weak, autumnal sun smeared across its face and I wished that I could have painted it. I don’t know how to paint, which so far is the only thing I’ve learned in my painting class, but I felt good knowing that I could see this pink house and its light and feel that I wanted to do something like that. I’ve never been capable of seeing colour, light and shadow in this way before, and I’m happy for this new gift.