Lately I’ve been talking a lot about my friends and fellow writers. But today I’ve realized something. They don’t place nearly the priority I do on writing. I ask what they’re doing this weekend, and writing is last on the list, not first. It’s the “get to it if I can” thing. And we all know what usually happens to that thing, don’t we? Granted, laundry and shopping and work must be done, but what is this “you can’t force it” excuse I get when I nag?
Complete and total bullshit, that’s what. At least the way it’s interpreted. How many make-a-living-at-it writers got out there by writing when they “felt like it?” None. You know how many books I wrote in ten years of writing when I felt like it? Not one. Everything I did write in those years is and will probably forever remain incomplete.
I tell you it drives me insane. Of the group, me and the three writers I call friends, I am third, perhaps fourth down the list if arranged by talent. Yet Bly writes only fanfics, and says she doesn’t know how to write anything else. She says she can’t create characters. Bullshit, I say. No one can have such a firm grasp of someone else’s characters, and be unable to create her own. (She also says it’s too much work to write for a living. That I’ll believe, but what a waste!!)
Phoenix keeps sending her book out, which is more than I’ve managed. But when I ask her about writing, half the time I get everything else she’s done instead. Which is all important. But damn it, she’s letting it get in the way of the only thing (as she says) she’s ever wanted to do.
With BJ it’s her health and her house. She can’t work in a messy house, she says. And she is having a lot of health problems, so every time she gets anywhere on the house, a day or two of feeling like crap and she’s stuck again. But she won’t accept help and half the time won’t even admit it’s going on. And when she is doing well, all it takes is me talking about her submitting something to make her sick. Yes, she’s noticed the link between the events–but she hasn’t managed to fight it to the point of accomplishing anything.
I’m sorry, I just find it impossible to believe I’m the only one disciplined enough to get anywhere. Come ON. Me? Disciplined?
But I guess that’s what you call it, when you work towards your dream every single day. I think I’ve taken one day completely off from writing in the past six months. Maybe even in the past year.
And before I hear about it, I am not saying “write two pages every day even if it’s crap.” Not now. I’ll explain the truth of that in another blog. 😉