How Do You Start Writing Songs?

No matter the books that can be read about it, the years of instrumental practice that can be put in, or the cover songs that can be played ad nauseum, every songwriter from Bob Dylan to Brian Davis has that moment when they actually have to start writing; the moment when the rubber finally meets the road and every intangible, ethereal desire to "write songs" is forced into the Terrordome where your lyrics and melodic notes are on a page for the first time. There was a gap of about three years between when I bought my first guitar and when I tried to write my first song. On a nondescript payday from my bowling alley job (where I was making a cool $6/hour), I went to Elmore's music with two of my friends to get a guitar that ended up being a $175 Dean Vendetta electric that currently sits, like some broken, holy artifact, in the back of my closet without strings or a bridge. It seems I mostly made this purchase on a whim that my 18-year-old self decided to prioritize, a momentary…