Meet my inner goldfish

*points to self*
Yes! I am a goldfish.
At least I think I am. I couldn't tell you for sure, because really… by the time I wonder if I'm a goldfish, I have forgotten what the question was.
My attention span is severely lacking these days and I get easily — Oh, look! A shiny new toaster!
Err.
Where was I?
Goldfish. Right. Sorry about that.
  My middle name should be Dory. (As in Finding Nemo, Dory) I often feel like her, especially while I'm writing. I'm somewhere else, people talk to me, and eventually that droning noise will get my attention and I'll give them a blank look — because I have no idea what they are talking about, even if I've been giving all the right responses.
My goldfish-ness is directly related to writing.
I'm antisocial. Or just solitary, I don't know, but I think antisocial hits the nail on the head. Most writers are, to some degree, because writing is a solitary business and we need to be able to tune out the rest of the world. Some might argue it's a lonely business, but I'd disagree. It can be lonely, yes, but most writers will interact with other writers on a daily basis. Just writers, though. Not other fellow humans.
We don't deal well with them, because they don't understand us. They don't get that your characters live inside you, are part of you, talk to you. All. The. Time.
Maybe we're all just antisocial schizophrenics? My teacher once told me point blank that there is "something wrong" with me and suggested to my mother to make me go see a shrink. Sadly, I was eight years old at the time, and I took it to heart. For years, decades, I actually believed there is something intrinsically wrong with me. I thought I was alone in the world with the way I "saw" stories and it took overhearing a conversation at a Romantic Times convention to make me realize that no, I'm not the only one this happens to.
Here was a writer who boldly told her fellow humans that she "writes it down as she sees it", that there is "a movie playing in my head". Picture my jaw falling to the floor.
I was not alone!
I don't know who she was. I didn't ask, didn't approach. I had to come to terms with the fact that my teacher was a stupid, unimaginative, destructive bitch who shouldn't have been let loose on children.
I would like to thank this nameless writer for her courage. She made me feel less like a freak, and I will be forever grateful to her — whoever she is. I truly hope all your dreams come true.
I'm still a freak among "normal" human beings. My mind wanders, I'm still antisocial and my inner goldfish is alive and swimming along nicely — finding ever new shiny things to divert itself – but at least I know I'm not totally weird, now.

It helps!

However… seeing the clip below makes me reevaluate the attention span of goldfish!

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OjnUiyf5YJU