Stream of Consciousness

A blog by Chicken Wrangler Sara

I really enjoyed my English classes in high school.  I remember reading James Joyce.  I don’t remember exactly what we read, only that he used a technique called stream of consciousness.

The way I remember it being explained is writing as your mind wanders, like right before you fall asleep.  You just move from one topic to the next with only a thread of connection.

I believe the children’s version of stream of consciousness is seen in  If You Give a Mouse a Cookie by Laura Numeroff.

I thought about this as I got ready to go to work this morning.

I opened the fridge to make my salad for lunch and remembered I needed to clean out the produce drawer.  We have some peaches in a brown sack that needed to go into the drawer.

So I cleaned the drawer and moved the peaches.

Then as I moved the peaches I saw my jar of sour dough starter.  That reminded me that I was taking some to a friend this evening so I took it out to feed it.

Then I remembered I wanted to take some blueberry bars to our community group tonight also.  I got them out of the back fridge and moved them into a different container that would fit in the front fridge where I could see it.

Then I remembered the teacher I am helping at school right now asked me to bring my paper shredder to school so I went to get it.  When I unplugged it, I saw all the dirt and dust and dog hair that had been under it so I cleaned the floor in that area.

I loaded it into my car and came back into the kitchen to get my lunch and my water.  When I opened the freezer to fill my cup with ice, I realized the ice trays needed to be emptied.

At this point I needed to get to work and I was afraid if I emptied the ice trays, I would remember something else so I went to work.

So instead of saying I got sidetracked I say I had a “stream of consciousness morning.”  It sounds so much better.