Prompt: Take 15-30 minutes to write about the following: What is your writing space? Describe it. Talk about noise, distractions. Talk about how you focus and how you create. Talk about what conditions are essential for you to write.

Response: My writing space is not so much a place as it is a mindset. I’ve written during seminars and lectures, on road trips and flights, and on South African balconies overlooking the sea. Rarely do I need a desk and a lamp, although while I’m at school, that tends to be the case. Harsh yellow light reflects from my dormitory window as I type away on my laptop. The chair makes my back ache, with its hardbacked wooden frame and annoyingly curved legs. Despite this, I write as best I can, which most days, is a little more than a mediocre attempt at having my words make sense. Again, I don’t have a specific writing space, though I really should. If anything, my writing space can be anywhere, as long as I have headphones. My first pair of writing headphones was a bulky thing, with wide black cushioned pillows that squeezed my head until I thought it would burst. Back then, I really thought that those headphones literally pushed my ideas and words out from my fingertips and onto an electronic page. I’d listen to musical soundtrack after musical soundtrack. Traditional hits such as The Phantom of the Opera and Cabaret constantly rang in my head, their somber notes of romantic ideologies playing over and over. From tradition came the off-Broadway hits, like Hedwig and the Angry Inch, where I was introduced to the manic anger and desperation that would eventually find their way into my stories. After I retired my bulky pair, I was gifted with wired earbuds, my favorite pair being black with iridescent green highlights. They were actually born from an accident, when my partner accidentally knocked my laptop to the ground, coincidentally snapping the plug-in as it landed. My partner then gifted me the black earbuds, mostly I think, to clear her conscience. Through those earbuds, classic rock came. Thundering drums and sleezy-sounding guitars pronounced that all anyone should care about was sex and drums and rock and roll. Meatloaf proclaimed his insatiable appetite for riding along flaming highways and escaping the mundane ideas of society, so much so that I was moved when he plummeted to the bottom of a cliff in a blazing song, torn and twisted at the berm of a burning bike. Although, while I listened to rock and roll, I found that my words couldn’t keep up. I lacked the grittiness and lust for freedom in my words. This isn’t to say I gave up, rather, I found new inspiration. Airpods were a Christmas gift that I greedily took hold of. Blocking out the world had never been so sweet. With noise cancelling capabilities, I could block out the entire world, focusing only on my words, only on what I wanted to write. Classical music drifted through my head, with soft piano keys playing chords in major and minor, seemingly without a care in the world. Lately, I’ve found that something is missing. With music and lyrics, I had always been able to discern feeling and a rhythm for my work. Now, I feel through classical music, yet it seems wrong. I can no longer hear the conversations of my friends that accompanied Freddie Mercury’s ballads or roared over the sounds of a squealing Telecaster. Music is important to my creative work. It’s something that has always accompanied me wherever I wrote, be it train, plane, or seminar. Yet, music has never been the muse of which I write, but rather, the soundtrack cast behind the laughter of friends. I need to hear the stories of others. I need to see their joy, their sorrow, their confusion as to why I ask them how they felt during certain moments. I don’t need a place to write. I don’t need a desk or a pen. I do need people. Sometimes, I may need them a bit more than I need earbuds and music.