The Middle

I think The Middle is misunderstood. No one seems to like him. People curse The Middle.
I'm in the middle of nowhere!
This is the middle of hell!
It's the middle of the night!
Get off the middle of the road!


Other middles we hate are middle aged, middle of the ocean, middle ages (otherwise known as the dark ages, right?) mid life crisis, middle child syndrome, saggy middles...

But lately The Middle and I are getting to know one another.
And I am finding that The Middle is quite a useful fellow. He is like a pause. A reflection. Tell me you don't have time to think when you are in the middle of nowhere? Lost people have lots of time to think. The middle says I am half way to something, to somewhere. He lets me know I am on a path and that now might be a good time to look around and wonder where I am going, where I want to be, where I should be and perhaps why the heck I am even in the middle in the first place?

The Middle of anything can be thunderously lonely, or it can be space to breath and assess. See The Middle is a man of questions. A scholar if you will. A voice that asks who you are and what you want, simply by showing up and being The middle. In the middle of writing my book I paused frequently to ask 'What is the point? What is this all about? Where am I going with the plot and should I be going there?' Very important middle questions, don't you think?

The only time The Middle can be difficult is when you think you are at The End. Then being in The Middle can knock the air right out of you. When I think I am done, when I think the fight is over and the journey almost finished, to find myself so firmly holding The Middle's hand is a bit of a shock.

But I refuse to move on until I am done here. The Middle might have one more powerful lesson to teach me. And what a fool I would be to miss it.

What about you? What does the middle mean to you or your writing? How do you cope in the middle of things?