{"id":261,"date":"2023-08-10T16:18:34","date_gmt":"2023-08-10T16:18:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/?p=261"},"modified":"2023-08-10T16:18:35","modified_gmt":"2023-08-10T16:18:35","slug":"why","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/why\/","title":{"rendered":"Why?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Sometimes late at night or when I wake up in the morning a sentence or two unrelated to anything invades my brain. Often, it\u2019s a line of dialogue with no context. Whatever it is, and from whatever recesses of my unconscious it arises, I then lay in bed for the longest time writing and re-writing it in my mind, experimenting with the words and their arrangement. I guess I do that because I\u2019m a writer, and I wonder if other writers do the same.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This morning was one of the strangest ever. I (or some unidentified narrator or protagonist) said, \u201cI once knew this guy whose name was William W. Whye, pronounced like <em>way<\/em>. The middle-name initial <em>W<\/em> was for another Whye, but this whye was pronounced <em>why <\/em>or like the letter <em>Y, <\/em>according to his mother, who should know since she gave him the name. She never said why she pronounce <em>way why<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I lay in bed for maybe ten or fifteen minutes playing with various ways of using whye and why and way in a sentence and thoughts of using William W. Whye\u2019s name in a poem or a story until my thoughts devolved into something about Little Miss Muffet eating her curds and whey, and then I knew it was time to get up. &nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sometimes late at night or when I wake up in the morning a sentence or two unrelated to anything invades my brain. Often, it\u2019s a line of dialogue with no context. Whatever it is, and from whatever recesses of my unconscious it arises, I then lay in bed for the longest time writing and re-writing &#8230; <\/p>\n<p class=\"read-more-container\"><a title=\"Why?\" class=\"read-more button\" href=\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/why\/#more-261\" aria-label=\"Read more about Why?\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-261","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.1.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Why? - Alec Clayton - Writing etc.<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/why\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Why? - Alec Clayton - Writing etc.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Sometimes late at night or when I wake up in the morning a sentence or two unrelated to anything invades my brain. Often, it\u2019s a line of dialogue with no context. Whatever it is, and from whatever recesses of my unconscious it arises, I then lay in bed for the longest time writing and re-writing ... Read more\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/why\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Alec Clayton - Writing etc.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2023-08-10T16:18:34+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2023-08-10T16:18:35+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Alec Clayton\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Alec Clayton\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/why\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/why\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Alec Clayton\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/#\/schema\/person\/92241ec993cfed51e207de72a10bc70c\"},\"headline\":\"Why?\",\"datePublished\":\"2023-08-10T16:18:34+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2023-08-10T16:18:35+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/why\/\"},\"wordCount\":222,\"commentCount\":1,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/#\/schema\/person\/92241ec993cfed51e207de72a10bc70c\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/why\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/why\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/why\/\",\"name\":\"Why? - Alec Clayton - Writing etc.\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2023-08-10T16:18:34+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2023-08-10T16:18:35+00:00\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/why\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/why\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/why\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Why?\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/\",\"name\":\"Alec Clayton - Writing etc.\",\"description\":\"Alec Clayton - Writing etc.\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/#\/schema\/person\/92241ec993cfed51e207de72a10bc70c\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":[\"Person\",\"Organization\"],\"@id\":\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/#\/schema\/person\/92241ec993cfed51e207de72a10bc70c\",\"name\":\"Alec Clayton\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"http:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/writingetc-top.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"http:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/writingetc-top.png\",\"width\":406,\"height\":89,\"caption\":\"Alec Clayton\"},\"logo\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\"},\"description\":\"I am a novelist and theater and art critic. I write for OLY ARTS (Olympia). My novels, published with Mud Flat Press, are: \\\"Teacher; This is Me, Debbi, David;\\\" \\\"Tupelo;\\\" The Freedom Trilogy (a three-book series consisting of \\\"The Backside of Nowhere,\\\" \\\"Return to Freedom\\\" and \\\"Visual Liberties\\\"); \\\"Reunion at the Wetside;\\\" \\\"The Wives of Marty Winters;\\\" \\\"Imprudent Zeal;\\\" and \\\"Until the Dawn.\\\" I've also published two books on art, \\\"As If Art Matters\\\" and \\\"What is What the Heck is a Frame-Pedestal Aesthetic? 1960s Revolution in American Art Revisited.\\\" All are available on amazon.com or can be ordered from your local bookstore. 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I write for OLY ARTS (Olympia). My novels, published with Mud Flat Press, are: \"Teacher; This is Me, Debbi, David;\" \"Tupelo;\" The Freedom Trilogy (a three-book series consisting of \"The Backside of Nowhere,\" \"Return to Freedom\" and \"Visual Liberties\"); \"Reunion at the Wetside;\" \"The Wives of Marty Winters;\" \"Imprudent Zeal;\" and \"Until the Dawn.\" I've also published two books on art, \"As If Art Matters\" and \"What is What the Heck is a Frame-Pedestal Aesthetic? 1960s Revolution in American Art Revisited.\" All are available on amazon.com or can be ordered from your local bookstore. I grew up in Tupelo and Hattiesburg, Mississippi, and have been living in the Pacific Northwest since 1988.","sameAs":["http:\/\/www.alecclayton.com\/"],"url":"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/author\/alecclayton\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/261","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=261"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/261\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":262,"href":"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/261\/revisions\/262"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=261"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=261"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alecclayton.com\/writingetc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=261"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}