The Creepiness of Life

It's happening again. Every couple of weeks I sit myself down for the "all you're going to do is write" lecture. I hang tough for a few days and then... life creeps back in. I know I can't keep life out, and I don't want to. I would, however, prefer to limit my involvement in it until the late afternoon hours.

But how do you hold life back? This week is a good example. Monday was trashed as we had to drive 3 hours to Fayetteville and 3 hours back to deliver the Saturn to Blair's sister. Tuesday morning I had my eyes dilated--the only time Blair could work into his schedule to take me--and couldn't sit at a computer or read a book for 4 hours afterward. Right there, two working days down the drain.

Or is it really? Nothing is stopping me from working in the evenings, except myself. I'm a morning writer, useless after 2 pm. Plus, I only get to see Blair for 1-2 hours each night--I'd prefer to take advantage of that versus sitting in front of a computer while he's home.

Blair raised a good point the other day when I was complaining about how I let "stuff" get in the way of my writing time. "You always make time for running," he said. "What's the difference?"

Hmmm. Excellent question. Part of the difference is I run with people. I make time because I know people are waiting on me to show up. If I have to run alone... a lot of times it still get skipped (or mileage reduced). There's no getting around the fact that writing is lonely. It's you, a laptop, and your thoughts. And the really hard part is doing the work while having no idea if there will ever be a payoff. I'm fine being a starving, struggling artist for two years, so long as I know that at the end of the two years, it was all for a purpose. The not knowingness is maddening.

But I've shaken myself off and given the speech yet again. I've marked out 8-noon all week next week as uninterrupted writing time. No checking e-mail, answering phones, doing laundry, petting cats, eating meals, running errands, or scheduling meetings. Four hours is not much to ask of myself. But if it's four hours of butt-in-the-chair-doing-the-work writing time, the payoff will be immense.

So don't call, don't write, don't e-mail, and don't bother me... unless it's after 3 pm. =)

Dena