Despite All Evidence to the Contrary

Jessica Gale via Morguefile

My office is littered with evidence that I'm a writer. A mug with "writer" emblazoned on it and a "Best. Writer. Ever." mouse pad (both gifts). Books with my name on the spine. I even used to have a clock until it stopped working.

Right now that seems like an apt analogy.

Lately, I haven't felt like much of a writer. I thought for sure that all this time at home would make it easier to find time to write but all the changes that have come with that time have made it hard to get myself into the writing frame of mind. My blog posts have become habit and, although I don't have a Kardashian-like following, I know there are people reading them, so I am motivated to write those. But, when it comes to my actual writing projects, I seem to run out of day/energy/motivation before I get to them.

I know I'm not alone. I see lots of other writers on social media saying the same thing.

Part of the problem is that, with online classes, I'm now on the computer all the time and so writing, once a break from the day-to-day has become one more keyboard-related task. I considered writing in longhand like my colleague Mike does but, not only has my handwriting become a mess, I'd then have to find time to get all of those notes onto the computer.

And now I've come full circle.

It doesn't help that I'm at the revision stage in nearly every project I'm working on. If I were composing instead of revising, my characters and a sense of "what happens next?" would nudge me back to the keyboard. But, as it stands now, the part of the process I like least has collided with a challenging time where my creative and emotional energies are sapped before I even open my laptop, let alone a file.

And so I'm working on finding avenues in, be they guilt (leaving the file for my work-in-progress in the middle of my workspace where I can't ignore it), other writing tasks (promotion of existing works, a search for an agent to represent the work I'm revising), and creative approaches (sketchnoting the tasks or steps I need to complete for each project). Then there are the old stand-bys: goal-setting and deadlines.

Progress is slow, but it's happening (that guilt thing was pretty powerful). Next week's break in the online class action might offer me both the opportunity and the downtime to change my mindset from creating classes to re-visiting characters. Like any visit, once I get there, I always want to stay a little longer.

Now I just need to decide which road to take to get there in the first place.

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Ready or Not, Here I Come!

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I am counting down to the beach, and I couldn't be more excited.

Last summer, for the first time in a long time, we didn't go to the beach. I didn't get to brainstorm characters while sitting under an umbrella on the sand with the ocean just a few feet away. I didn't get to post my blogs from the screened-in porch. I didn't get to browse in my favorite indie bookstore.

But all of that is about to change. My fall break is coming, and so is my beach vacation.

Before you waste too much sympathy on my alleged beach deprivation, let me just say that we didn't go to the beach because we went to Ireland instead. My daughter spent a semester in Cork and so we spent spring break visiting her.  As much as I love my beach trips, I have to say that the tradeoff was more than fair.

But I'm ready.

I'm not a hot weather fan, so fall beach trips are right up my alley. I love bundling up under a blanket on the screened-in porch and I long ago traded in swimsuits for the more comfortable beach attire of shorts and a tee shirt, so upgrading to a sweatshirt isn't a big deal.

I'm a unlikely beach goer. I don't swim or surf and more than 20 minutes in the sun is too much for me. But I love to sit under an umbrella and read (or write) with the sound of the ocean as my background. And I love to sit out on the patio with my laptop or my journal (and, with few exceptions, I journal only at the beach) listening to the frogs in the creek below.

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Right now, my clothes and toiletries are in their usual locations and my suitcase is still in the basement, but my journals are sitting out, waiting to be slipped into a bag and taken along for the ride. I have lesson plans to write and papers to grade, but these activities (which usually consume my thoughts) are merely hurdles to clear before I can depart for my desired destination. I will do them with the same level of dedication they usually demand, but I'll do so knowing that each task I complete takes me one step closer to that screened-in porch where I'll meet my characters and my deadlines.

I'm ready -- well, except for the grading and the planning and the packing.

But if mental preparedness counts for anything, I'm already there.

Elegy (of sorts) for a Laptop

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Yesterday, I finally got frustrated enough with my MacBook to cave in and take it to the Apple Store, not-so-secretly hoping that a new MacBook was the answer. Don't get me wrong -- I love my MacBook -- but at six years old and counting, its age is showing. The lag time between typing in, say, a web address, and having it appear on screen is not as bad as the old AOL dial-up connection delay, but let's just say it's frustrating to try to do much of anything in a hurry. In addition, it was no longer possible to work for any length of time without plugging it in. Case in point: I teach from 11 - 1:45 on Tuesdays and Thursdays. One day, when I forgot to plug my MacBook in between classes, it died partway through my second class, giving me that sad, sad, red, empty battery icon and forcing me to figure out what to do in the absence of any visuals while it powered back up.

Oops.

So, when the technician at the Genius Bar referred to my laptop as vintage (better it than me), I had a feeling my dream of a new laptop -- one that responded in real time -- might actually be realistic.

In the end, the only rationalization I could come up with for replacing the battery instead of the machine itself was price. In addition to its speed challenge, the old MacBook no longer accepts the newest software updates. I could very easily end up spending over a hundred dollars on a new battery only to have the old machine outlive its usefulness.

And useful it was. I wrote two novels (almost three) on that MacBook, one of which I've already published. I wrote more blogs and articles than I can count, along with two book proposals, including the one for Know Thyself: The Imperfectionist's Guide to Sorting Your Stuff, which is currently in my editor's hands. I learned how to use Keynote and Pages and Canva, creating course materials, promo materials and playing with presentations and graphic design just for fun. I learned how to use Twitter and refined my skills on that machine. I poured out my heart in personal emails and wrote my mom's obituary.

It was a very good MacBook.

And so I did the only thing I could. I retired it while I still have fond memories of it and before its power is gone completely. Like any outgoing expert, it can train its replacement, sharing files and wisdom (okay, maybe not wisdom) and serving in a limited capacity while being allowed more rest than a full-time laptop can manage.

I wasn't thrilled by all the bells and whistles on the newest MacBooks, so my new MacBook looks exactly like my old one. Over time, it will earn its own place in my heart, (its shiny, clean screen and increased power are an excellent start) as I finish old works and start new ones I haven't even dreamed of yet.

Zazzle.com

But I'm not counting the old one out just yet. After all, a Jersey girl's laptop is bound to have had some stubborn determination transferred to it after six years of tapping away at its keys. Battle-scarred (you should see the keyboard) or not, it's tough and I suspect it has more life in it than it lets on.

Twin MacBooks, six years apart. What more could a Jersey writer wish for?

Committed Time

Photo by freestocks.org on Unsplash

Today, I am talking to the students in my first year seminar about time management. The reading they did for today's class focused on three categories of items to be scheduled: committed time, maintenance time and discretionary time. Their book had a whole list of items that fit into each category, but I'm more interested in how they would categorize each of the important things in their lives.

How we classify what matters to us is often the first step in determining what makes it onto the schedule and what doesn't. What makes it onto the schedule determines not only what we accomplish, but also whether we're reaching toward our goals or someone else's.

No matter how busy I am, blogging always makes it onto the schedule. I'm still not sure why this is, but I know my blogs matter to me because I consistently place them above other things on my priority list. From time to time, I re-evaluate the schedule: two blogs a week here (plus a Friday Feature), two blogs at Organizing by STYLE and one at CatholicMom.com, often a reprint of something that already appeared on my OBS blog. When I look at the schedule, I often wonder if I should scale back, but I never do.

I started blogging as something I was supposed to do -- a plank in my writing platform -- one small thing that fits into the self-promotion category. Over time, however, it began to provide a consistent writing experience and a connection to readers more immediate than the one I find when I finally finish a novel or have an article appear in print. I'm willing to yield discretionary time to this activity because it contributes to not just an important overall goal (writing), but a piece of who I am.

Photo: Felix Russell-Saw via Unsplash

I am a writer. And on the days when the muse has been crushed by other activities in the committed time category, blogging wriggles free and allows me to express myself. I don't have to advance a story or be true to any character except myself. I merely need to write.

From the perspective of someone working to finish two novels and as many non-fiction projects, I must admit that blogging doesn't always seem like the most efficient use of my time. But, over time, I've discovered that it feeds not only my writer identity, but my writing skills and process as well.

Today, when I split my students up into groups and ask them to define the activities that fit into each time management category, I might just need to do a little introspection myself. After all, what better way could there be to stay on track, and make sure I'm reaching for my own goals, and not someone else's?

Muddling Through Monday

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Today is a muddled kind of Monday. Celebration aftereffects have co-mingled with reality and the burgeoning independence of my newly minted graduate to create a mental morass that makes it hard to focus on a topic, let alone write about one.

Then I remember. Writers don't need to be constrained by anything as mundane and inconvenient as reality. If today is too confusing, too upsetting, too overwhelming, I merely need to leave it behind and enter the world of my characters. Doing so is hard work, and the on-ramp to this world is often uphill, but writing is also a vacation of sorts; it's a way to leave behind the puzzling pieces of the real world and weave a world of my own choosing where I am the master of what occurs. At least until my characters step in to voice their opinions.

Speaking of which, my characters will be doing the talking right here, beginning this Wednesday as I kick off a new feature where I interview some of the players from Casting the First Stone and Chasing a Second Chance. I've spoken with a few of them already (yes, I know how that sounds), so I have a few interviews ready to go, but I'm also happy to take requests, as I'm subjecting all of them to the same interview process.

Also, if you're looking for some fun summer reads, I hope you'll visit The Beach Reads Bonanza, a Facebook party which kicks off tomorrow at noon CST (1 PM ET). I'm up first, hosting from 1-1:30 or so, and will be followed by a flood of authors chatting and sharing book information. There will be games, prizes and great titles to add to your summer wish list, so I hope you'll stop by :-) The Beach Reads Bonanza runs through Monday, June 13.

And now, back to reality...or not. I hear it's overrated.

Photo: Pippalou via Morguefile

Friday Feature: How to be a Writer

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Last week, J. K. Rowling had Twitter, along with most news outlets, all abuzz when she shared two rejection letters she'd received to queries she'd sent out under her pen name, Robert Galbraith. That's after Harry Potter fame, folks. And yes, some of the same people rejected her. Twice.

Authors are amazingly generous, sharing everything from rejection letters to markets to support. About a week before this, I'd read a great article by Warren Adler, author of The War of the Roses, called How to be a Writer at Any Age. Not only do I agree with all of his points, but I also aspire to be the oldest working writer people know :-)

How about you? Have you ever wanted to write? If so, take a look at Adler's tips. They're uplifting and practical, shared freely by a working writer. Or maybe you want to read Rowling's tweets and her rejection letters, also shared freely by a working writer -- one who knows what she's talking about.

Free advice that's worth much more. How can you pass it up?

I always knew that when I retired, writing would be a big part of my life. I looked forward to the day when I could unapologetically devote long stretches of time to writing books, articles, blogs...whatever genre the muse bestowed when she visited.

But I never thought about the subtle differences that would emerge once I began to take my writing seriously enough to dub it a profession. Calling myself a writer seemed so audacious that the title brought with it a compulsion to produce, and it wasn’t long before I discovered that the muse played a very small walk-on role in the life of a serious writer. 

Inspiration is important, certainly, but writing, like any other profession, requires that the writer possesses the dedication to show up and do it, even on the days when the process isn’t easy. Just as good teachers need lesson plans to flesh out their inspirations, good writers need writing plans to develop the ideas the muse provides.

But a funny thing happened on the way to becoming a professional writer: it became increasingly difficult to “leave my work at the office.” 

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The weekend before last, for example, we were at the beach. I sat in a beach chair under an umbrella on a perfect beach day, with a bag full of magazines and a fully loaded Kindle. I had come prepared to read (and nap) without feeling guilty for not being productive. What was the first thing I pulled out of my bag? A notebook.

I have to write. Not because I’m under a deadline or even because a story is nagging at me (well, maybe a little of the second one) but because it’s a day that ends in “y”.

I’m not being a smart aleck. On days when I don’t write, or at least do something writing-related, I feel as though something is missing. I’ve been at this long enough and I have so many projects and ideas floating around in my head that there never seems to be enough time to tackle them all. 

When I don’t write, I feel as though something is missing; the day feels sort of off-kilter until I get some writing time in. I wish I felt this way about exercising or cleaning or cooking, but I don’t. Only writing.

And so when I pack for the beach -- or any other vacation -- I pack a notebook, and on this last trip, for close to an hour on beach days, I scribbled away, trying out a “beach sprint” in longhand. These entries will most likely become blogs (some, like this one, already have), and I will feel productive because I have them written ahead of schedule, but that is beside the point. Before I can read or nap or any of the myriad other things to be done at the beach, I must write.

A theatre friend of mine liked to say that we act because we must. Actors can’t not act. 

And writers can’t not write. Admittedly, some of our writing gets hidden away in a desk drawer or computer file; sometimes it’s the clutter we need to cut through to get to the idea inside. Those writings are a writer’s rehearsal -- not quite ready for an audience, but necessary to the writing process. 

And though it makes little sense to those who don’t share a passion for writing (and is, in fact, a source of irritation when it creeps into family time or vacation time), writing, for writers, is like eating and breathing and sleeping -- so much a part of who we are that we are unable to function when we go for long periods of time without indulging ourselves. 

We don’t know how to be any other way.