All It Took Was a Wobbly Wheel

It’s a late Sunday afternoon. I’m driving to the grocery store through the thick August air. As usual, I have my Apple Music library on shuffle as I cruise down the road. I’m deep in thought about all of the problems I am currently trying to solve and trying to find solutions to them. I’m also getting frustrated because I’m stuck. I’m trying to force myself to think of the answers and I’m getting frustrating that I’m not coming up with anything. Nothing sparks an idea for a song of my own. A workshop exercise I’d like to teach. A joke. A business idea. A t-shirt to sell. I got nothing.

Then I realize what’s going on. I’m thinking too much. I’m not allowing myself to be open to new experiences. It’s causing me to be void of new ideas. Creativity comes from experiences. If you stop experiencing life, you don’t gain new perspectives on the world.

In that moment, I turned off the music. Which was hard, because it was the song “Ruin” by Cat Power. I love that song. I decided to just absorb my surroundings. I challenged myself to notice something. It didn’t really matter what, just something that inspired thought. Within probably 30 seconds, it happened. I was worried I was forcing it, but I wasn’t. I saw one thing and when I noticed more and more details, I became more curious.

The left back wheel of the truck in front me was wobbly, as if it wasn’t put on correctly. The driver had his window down and smoke was billowing out from his cigarette. It was a white Ford Maverick truck that was clean. It had a cover over the truck bed. It was obviously a truck that was well taken care of. With a cool name like Maverick, I was certain the drive longed for the truck and was probably so proud when he finally bought it and drove it off of the lot.

The man who was driving the truck looked well kept and put together as well. What struck me was that he had this nice truck, without a scratch on it, probably newly waxed, yet the tire looked like it was going to fly off any minute. The truck perfectly matched the driver. A well-put-together man that seemingly appears to be healthy, yet he was smoking a cigarette. Both the truck and driver were on the brink of catastrophe. I wondered, was this on purpose? Is he driving with the wheel the way it is and smoking because he wants to challenge death? Or is he oblivious? Does he even know the wheel is misaligned? He has to know that cigarettes are dangerous. Does he just think “it couldn’t happen to me?”

As soon as I got out of my own head, I noticed something. It was interesting and sparked many thoughts. Now I have a character. Maybe I’ll write a song about him, or a story, or something else. For now, I wrote this. It didn’t exist before, and now it does. I created something from nothing. All it takes it not thinking about what I should create and experiencing the world around me.