Bob was worried about what he should write. He loved to write, but it was difficult to do it once you grabbed the paper. He was a fountain of ideas, but when looking at the white expanse in front of him, he was clueless. The only ideas he could come up with, were completely unoriginal, and not worth the effort to put pencil to paper. He leaned back in his swivel chair, and aimlessly spun around in circles, staring at the ceiling of his room. Of all the times to go blank, now was the worst.

For hours, he wasted time, either drawing unrecognizable blobs, or staring off into space. Every so often, an idea would come to him, and he would ready his pencil, but he quickly realized that it wasn't a good one.

He had no idea what to write, as he had originally thought to write a story, but for whatever reason, that did not appeal to him then. He briefly considered writing nonfiction, but that was quickly dismissed, as he doubted anything would be more dull. It was clear he had to write fiction, but what to write?

He decided to build from the base up, as he rolled his chair over to his computer, and pulled up a list of writing genres on Wikipedia. Crime/detective stories were out of the question. Fable was a maybe, as was Fairy tale. Fan fiction was a no, he was against writing unoriginal stories. And Fantasy was a definite maybe.

As he scrolled down the list, he quickly crossed off a lot of the genres. Romance? Eww, he thought. Humor? I’m not funny, so no. Mystery? Isn't that the same as Crime/detective? Picture book is a definite no. Suspense/thriller, Tall tale and Western? No, no, and no.

Before long, he had a short list of genres left, all of which he transcribed on the back of his paper.

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Fable or Fairy Tale was a maybe.

Fantasy was a definite maybe.

Historical fiction was a possibility, as long as it wasn't too realistic.

Magical realism was a definite maybe.

Mythopoeia could be interesting.

And Science fiction could be fun to write about.

Everything else on Wiki’s list wasn't worth it, he decided. And then, rolling back over to his deck, he once more mulled over the paper.

It wasn't long before he decided to cross of Fable and Fairy tale. They were both still possibilities, but he didn't have a clue what to write in that genre. The same happened to Science fiction, which while he loved to read, he had no clue how to write it. Maybe a combination of Historical fiction and Mythopoeia, he mused. Or Fantasy and Magical realism. Or maybe even all of them! It wasn't long before he sighed in defeat, unable to come up with worthwhile ideas in any of the genres. Every time he felt the need to write, this happened. It was as if the universe was cursing him with a passion he couldn’t fulfill. He was sick and tired of it. The past few years he had told everyone he wanted to become a writer, but now it was clear it would never happen.

He glanced over his paper again, and all of a sudden, he had an idea. He rolled it around his mind, and he felt incredibly inspired by it. He grinned and began to write on his paper, the beginning of his story.

A couple minutes later, his mom called upstairs. “It’s time to eat!” she yelled.

“I’m working on my story”, he yelled back.

“You’ve been up there for 3 hours!” she yelled incredulously.

“But I just started!” he yelled back.