Reclaiming Literary Streaking

The act of writing in public has for too long been the providence of desperately sensitive teenage poets - guilty - and begrudging students writing timed essays - I cannot defend myself when I assign such things. But, it doesn't have to be.

The less I rely on a more traditional means of conveying my thoughts to paper, namely, ink that spills from a greedy pen as opposed to that which is transferred from printer to page, the more I find the process becomes insular, furtive in ways I don't always enjoy, a secretive activity as opposed to one that is shared, for all I might beg an audience for the finished product.

Which is not to say I don't regard writing as a sometimes necessarily private act. But, should choosing to write in a public place always be confined to behaviors of showmanship or those desperately seeking attention? How do we write differently when we know others are watching, or aren't? Can I enter the same places in my work surrounded by the hum and chatter of a world I usually, headphones clamped hard over my ears, attempt to keep out?

My charge, then, is this: Go somewhere, and write something. Bonus points if you're young enough, or possessed still of the boldness of youth, to write on public. Bathroom stalls in coffee houses shall no more be the dominion of lousy song lyrics and proclamations of endless love.