I type in one place, but I write all over the house. — Toni Morrison
I was talking to a writer friend recently. We were in a Starbucks in a Barnes & Noble and she was anxious to get back to her house because she was, as she said, “on a roll” with some writing. Of course, that got us talking even more — about how and when we write. And we were both relieved to hear that neither one of us does the saintly “I get up at four in the morning to write for a few hours before making the kids breakfast and getting them off to school” routine. Nothing makes me feel more guilty.
I don’t even have kids, and I still feel guilty. Four in the morning is for sleeping. Unless I have to get up to take a flight somewhere. Then it’s acceptable to be awake. Not great, but acceptable.
I tried writing the “morning pages” that Julia Cameron recommends in The Artist’s Way, and I discovered that there was one thing I always had to do first thing in the morning that was even more critical than writing three pages. So that didn’t work.
Then a good friend of mine turned Cameron’s advice upside down and developed something she calls “sleep writing,” doing the requisite three pages just before she falls asleep at night. That doesn’t work for me, either. I once woke up with a sharp pain in my side only to find the journal stabbing me in the ribs and my red pen leaking all over the sheets.
So I’m resigned to writing when the spirit moves me. I know. It’s not helpful advice to new writers. Sorry. I go to conference after conference and listen to successful writers reveal their writing secrets: longhand vs. computer. Writing in the morning vs. writing in the afternoon or evening. Getting up in the middle of the night. Staying up after everybody’s gone to bed. They have routines and discipline. Or at least they say they do.
Mind you, I’ve been a freelance business writer for more than 20 years now, so I have lots of discipline and a mad respect for deadlines. But when it comes to non-business writing, all bets are off. I can’t legislate creativity by staring at the proverbial blank sheet of paper at 9:00 in the morning and expect something wonderful to come out.
Tim O’Brien, whose book The Things They Carried is one of the books I’d want if I were stranded on a desert island, says he never knows what’s going to happen in his books until they happen. John Irving, on the other hand, plots out not only the overarching book structure in meticulous detail — he also plots out every chapter. And he writes the last chapter first. His book, A Prayer for Owen Meany, is another desert island selection of mine. Funny how two favorite authors can write so differently and still get remarkable results.
Me? I’m with Toni Morrison: I type in my office, but I write all over the house — and everywhere else that I can get away with it. On scraps of paper, in journals, across the white space on the Sunday New York Times crossword puzzle page around midnight. Sometimes I’m composing while I’m in the shower or while I’m playing computer Solitaire. Sometimes (I hate to admit) while I’m driving. And always when I’m traveling.
Otherwise I would have forgotten too much (and the memory isn’t what it used to be, anyway). I want to remember the Basque dinner in the Marais…the calla lilies in that little town in Mantova…my first lambic in Brugges…the street of half-timbered houses in Chartres…the funny pull-down plastic shower in the comfy B&B in Presteigne, Wales. And so I write the memories down. Just probably not at four a.m.
What about you? Where and when do you write? Are you one of the lucky ones with discipline? Have any tricks to share? Do tell. We want to know . . .
Buon viaggio!
Linda Dini Jenkins is a card-carrying Italophile, travel planner, freelance writer, and amateur photographer. Travel is her passion, so writing about her travels just comes naturally. She hopes all her travelers find a way to express their joys, surprises, and fears as they travel and gives every traveler a nifty journal to help smooth the way. Learn more…
