As you can tell from our tortoise shell glasses, we all suffer from poor vision (shout out to those with astigmatism, too).
Apparently, we use calligraphy to fancy it up sometimes. Because writing at an aesthetic diagonal gives you unfettered poetic license. Dip your nib to write “moist” or “epiphany” in calligraphy and tell me I’m wrong.
A writer’s love for anachronism is evident in the use of historic writing implements. It really takes us back to the harsh lived experience of the period. Behold the quill, originating from the 6th century when famine was a big deal, or my typewriter from the 19th century that was really just the century of cholera, am I right? Also, please call us scribes.
The close proximity of a small succulent or mason jar of peonies on our workspace compels us to remember that we aren’t completely dead inside.
A scribe’s only acceptable wardrobe is a good collared shirt or sensible cardigan, or a collared shirt under a sensible cardigan.
The ubiquitous mug suggests we drink a lot of coffee. This is true, but also it’s mostly scotch and yes, I know what time it is.
Writers are a frustrated lot. The crumpled-up balls of paper are simply a more satisfying indictment of our writing rather than the backspace button or a parent’s daily badgering of when this “hobby” is going to materialize into “a living wage.”
We frequently have pens near our mouth/in our mouth to aid in our pensive rumination. When we’re not secretly sucking out the ink in despair, the posture of this contemplation is reserved for rarefied writing endeavors: best man toasts, eulogies for family members who aren’t dead yet, but man you could really bring the house down by working in that E.E. Cummings poem; formal social media departure announcements; an origin story for that ungrateful SOB in The Giving Tree; and a personal treatise on why Friedrich was the best Von Trapp.
The pebbled, leather-bound journal is a mainstay in a writer’s life and where we record our flashes of brilliance—definitely not on old receipts, our children’s artwork, or a foggy bathroom mirror mid-shampooing.
Writers are a pensive lot and we often gaze out a window (rainy weather is best) for a mental break. We find this more productive than screaming (into pillows, into the void, et al).