On our knees

Words feed us just as they separate us.
We stand at parties, we hold drinks, we tell jokes, we laugh, and we talk politics.
But we are always aware of the differences between us and the people we like or even love. They are a part of the world in a way that we can never be. They inhabit their space. We observe and analyze, rub meaning from moments, and yet none of it is truly real to us until we write it down. And when we don't write — when we pretend that we can be like those we surround ourselves with, and fill our lives with kids and work and PTA and husbands who would rather watch TV than read — we end up on our knees.

Laurie Rachkus Uttich
Why We Write: The Space That Separates Us
from Poets & Writers magazine, Sept Oct 2011