Allan Wolf: I Wrote Obsessively on my Walls

When I was 13 I began my writing career by writing on my bedroom walls. I wrote nonsense phrases and drew bizarre pictures. I made up goofy rhymes and wrote down important events in my life. At the time, never really thought of it as a "notebook" or as a "journal" but my bedroom walls were both notebook and journal in one, a place where I could find my voice through writing and keep track of all the major events in my life.

I wrote obsessively on my walls all through Middle School and High School. I never asked permission, and my parents never forbade it. It was just something that I did. Years later, my mother would explain to me that she and my dad figured if I was going to be writing on walls, it was best that I did it at home.

I ended up writing a book, ZANE'S TRACE, about a kid, Zane Guesswind, who writes on his bedroom walls just as I did. Zane is convinced that whatever statements he writes on his walls will eventually come true. Although the book is obviously autobiographical, I was not as deluded as Zane. Yet I DO believe my walls had magical powers of a sort. The act of writing helped me to make it through a tumultuous youth. And although I no longer write on my walls at home (my wife won't let me) I still keep a notepad in my back pocket at all times. Just in case.

These are all "butt books" with pages filled front and back.  Notes about life. They go back years and years.  I keep 'em in a bin.  I break out in a sweat if I don't have one on me.  And a pen in my right pocket.  I've just gotten used to it. My wife and kids have gotten used to it.  It's just a thing we all take for granted.  "Oh there's Dad and his butt book."

And he descended from the mountain top, 

holding in his hand a little spiral note pad. 

And he called it "Butt Book."  

And it held a list of ordinary things.  

But when the poet wrote these ordinary things in the Butt Book, 

they became extraordinary.

But the Butt Book was lonely.  

And so the Poet brought forth a second Butt Book 

made in the image of the first except this one had more pages 

and was college-ruled and slightly more expensive.  

And together the Butt Books kept safe the many ideas 

which the poet wrote upon their pages.  

And the Poet decreed 

that the two Butt Books should love and cherish one another.  

(Although since they lived in North Carolina 

their union was not recognized by law.)

And in the years that followed

the Butt Books multiplied 

and begat many generations of Butt Books

and the Poet rejoiced and brought forth many inventive ideas 

which he wrote in the pages with his right hand, 

but sometimes with his left hand 

because the Poet was just like that. 

Allan Wolf is an author, poet, performer, and educator who lives in Asheville, North Carolina with his wife and three kids. After three years teaching at Virginia Tech, Wolf became the Educational Director for Poetry Alive!, a national touring company that presents theatrical poetry shows for all ages. Some of Wolf's books include THE BLOOD-HUNGRY SPLEEN AND OTHER POEMS ABOUT OUR PARTS (Candlewick), IMMERSED IN VERSE: AN INFORMATIVE, SLIGHTLY IRREVERENT, AND TOTALLY TREMENDOUS GUIDE TO LIVING THE POET'S LIFE (Lark Books), and THE WATCH THAT ENDS THE NIGHT (Candlewick). Conducting more than one hundred presentations every year, Allan Wolf is a veteran traveler through all the diverse worlds of verse from poetry slams to public schools, salons to saloons. And with literally hundreds of poems committed to memory, Wolf is always ready to spin out a stanza or two. Got rhyme?

Available Through Amazon

Allan Wolf has generously offered to send a personalized copy of ZANE'S TRACE to a reader of this post. Please just leave a comment below to be entered in a drawing.  The winner of  ZANE'S TRACE will be selected on Monday evening, April 30 and announced on Tuesday Morning, May 1.

The winner of NEST, NOOK, & CRANNY by Suz Blackaby is Janet F.! Please drop a line with your snail mail address in my e-mail box - amy at amylv dot com. Congratulations!