My mother is a songwriter and my father is a pathological liar. It's pretty obvious I was born to be a storyteller. I've been at it since I was a tot. At the age of three I would regale relatives and neighbors with the adventures of the herd of pink 'ephelumps' that lived under our kitchen sink. I told these tales so well I convinced myself they were true, and my parents dutifully emptied their water and food dishes late at night so I'd believe my pachyderms had eaten well. I told stories to other children on the bus, to the nurse who gave me my vaccinations, and to the mailman--until he grew weary of me and began throwing the letters onto the porch and speeding away. It seemed any occasion--whether normal or new--would trigger my imagination. The very first time a boy tried to stick his hand down my shirt I began babbling about the gnomes who lived in our dirty clothes hamper and would do your homework if you left a cinnamon stick and some maple syrup for their enjoyment. He ran from the room thinking I was nuts and never managed to cop a feel. Some stories are meant to entertain and some are meant to scare away the neighborhood pervert.

I think my current dilemma is directly related to the fact that I've had so many strange stories in my head since such an early age. Rather than suffering from writer's bloc, I suddenly find myself a victim of "writer's clutter."

Call it a fertile imagination, call it clinical insanity, call it whatever you like; but the truth is, there are too many stories in my head. Too many yarns. Too many anecdotes. Far too many fables.

Traditionally, I've been better at isolating them--at picking the narratives I want to let out and when. But lately I have no control whatsover. I try to work on one script, one letter, one note, and my mind quickly jumps the tracks, leaving my train of thought in a pile of unfinished adverbs and naked nouns. And once the locomotive is off the steel, my mind is incapable of going blank--it immediately begins spewing another story. I try to finish a scene that was to be faxed yesterday and suddenly I'm reliving moments with a lost love; imagining a much better ending than the one that rendered me dumped and weeping. There's an English country house and I'm wearing purple. I look so good in purple. And he's running through the yard carrying flowers and candy. And he's begging. And then a giant gopher jumps out of a hole--moving much faster than you'd imagine a giant gopher could--and swallows him up. And I run to the giant gopher and pound on its furry chest, shouting, "That's my candy you damn, dirty rodent!"

I try to shake the bizarre animal and his adventures out of my head. I begin actually, physically shaking my head really hard so that I trigger a headache. And the headache makes me think of the other day when I refilled the prescription for my migraine medication and the little man who sat out front in a dress and a flowered hat. I wonder what his story is and then quickly begin telling it myself...he probably wore the dress to stay cool since Los Angeles in December seems to be located at the corner of Hades and Inferno. The flowered hat just happened to go with the dress and...No, that's not it at all. He's casing the pharmacy! He became addicted to morphine after the war and an unfortunate dance with a cluster bomb and he's incognito now because no one would suspect an old man in a sundress and flowered hat of being a dangerous thief...

This nonsense is wearing me out. Even my trusty Diet Coke doesn't make me feel better.

Exorcism. It's so simple. All the people and places and colors in my head just waiting to spill onto the page or blurt out over a sparkling water at a cocktail party must be exorcised from my brain. I dial the familiar 818 number and wait patiently to ask if the Industry Health Fund covers exorcism. Oddly enough, the woman on the phone doesn't immediately hang up on me. She puts me on hold and comes back rather quickly to tell me I'm being transferred. I speak to someone else. I tell him I need an exorcism. He says it might fall under the 'wellness' category but he's not sure. He promises to find out and call me back. In the meantime I check the yellow pages. Sure enough, there's a listing for someone who performs exorcisms. I call and speak with an exorcism consultant. Lots of questions about drug abuse--the man seems surprised to find out there has been none--and about religion and church attendance--much to my grandmother's dismay, there has been none.

We hit a snag when I try to explain that there aren't voices in my head, just stories. The insurance guy beeps in and says I need to see an approved psychiatrist and read the section of the handbook on mental health coverage, specifically the electro shock paragraph. I click back to the consultant who suggests I contact one of the clergymen listed on their website. He also recommends an occult shop in Silver Lake that he considers an excellent source of products for cleansing one's brain, soul and other important organs of demons and whatnot. I hang up quickly before he can tell me a colonic will help clear my head.

As soon as I'm off the phone, into my head pops the story of a Frenchman selling flawed jewels out of his brick house on a street where the kudzu has gone mad and seems almost ready to smother passing dogs except that just as it reaches for their furry little legs the canines hear their masters calling and hurry a step or two just out of its green reach...

All writers sometimes have difficulty separating the stories, making logic out of mishmash. I remind myself of this as I take a few deep breaths and prepare to reclaim my discipline. The discipline to follow one tale until its end is the only thing that separates us from...well, I was going to say 'madness' but it seems a bit melodramatic. Perhaps 'padded rooms'?

Everyone has their own trick, their own plan for reclaiming clarity. Me, I go to the airport. I get myself a soda and sit down with my pen and pad in the middle of the busiest terminal. And then I listen. In an airport you hear more bits of lives and conversations and stories and pleas and arguments and bad jokes than anywhere else on the planet. To separate one idea from this jumble and follow it is a challenge. I take a few moments to select a target. My thoughts move past the bellowing of a man selling inspirational poems written by his wife, the crying of a child who wants to wade in the fountain, and the shouting of a woman with gold hoop earrings who wants to be upgraded at no charge because her favorite slacks were stolen out of her luggage. I settle my thoughts on the woman who cries quietly into her latte, clutching her briefcase with her other hand and ignoring the young man trying desperately to make things right again.

Twenty minutes later my story is finished. I read over it a few times. Not bad, not bad at all. I feel energized and empowered. I look to give a thankful nod to my inspiration but she is gone.

I add the story to my collection and begin another, remembering to be thankful for them all. I am a storyteller. Sometimes clear and sometimes tangled, these tales are never going to stop coming. I wouldn't know what to do if they did. So I'll just have to write them all down. One at a time.