I mean I hate white pages...
Once upon a time I got in my head to write a book. This was a horrible idea, akin to the world cursing me for some unspeakable wrong I or my family had committed.
As they must have been having a "2 for 1" sale that day in horrible ideas I realized that one book could not contain MY idea. No, it would take a trilogy of books to present my grand treatise to the world.
You may ask yourself why this is such a horrible thing, don't worry that is actually the first sign you are normal.
Picture this...
A small child is struggling to stand up on their own, to pull themselves up on unsure legs. Wobbling to and fro, jutting out limbs and their butts to maintain their new uprightness.
Now picture this...in a stroke of genius, you sign this struggling child up to run the Boston Marathon next week.
Thus my hatred of white pages...as years later that is what makes up the bulk of my accomplishments.
Until about a week ago. I went to listen to a lecture on psychology and story and there I heard something that lit a fire in my brain. Listening to how story works I realized that writing is teaching and that is why it is so hard.
The person that said that "those that can't do teach" never had good teachers. Teaching is one of the hardest things to do. You can't just know the information, you have to be able to explain it in a way so that others can as well. Being a guru with all the knowledge in the world doesn't help you teach and so your information will die with you. So what good were you?
The characters and story in a novel may be fictional but a writer still teaches them to the reader. Conveying the information of things that didn't happen to people that don't exist. But still tapping into the deeper truths that resonate throughout human history. A reader must be taught this story.
What does this have to do with whiskey?
The story a whiskey tells is both objective and subjective at the same time. Certain chemicals and processes exist as objective fact. But our understanding and abilities to detect and communicate them vary. As a whiskey writer and teacher my job is helping communicate those deeper truths in the whiskey. To help teach its story to those that come along so that they may in turn teach it to others.
White pages and empty whiskey glasses serve the same purpose. They are the vehicles we use to tell the story, the deeper truths, and the shared experience.
The story already exists, so pull up a chair and grab a glass and let me pour you a story and tell you a whiskey.