Happy Middle-of-Winter-Freaking-Cold Friday!
Okay, so maybe I'm a bit of a wimp. It's just that winter isn't my thing. Yanno? I have to fight hard not to be cranky.
Anyway. I wanted to take a moment to comment on last Fricassee's wonderful comments! It's funny how you never know to what extent your words are going to resonate with people. I was delighted by the "this really spoke to me" comments, and also enjoyed the various responses to my hypothetic neighbor-with-three-year-old-twins scenario.
And, you know, there is always a time and place to help others, and I hope I didn't come off as the type who would never bend her rigid back to help a neighbor or friend. My point, as I'm sure you know, was the prioritizing of one's writing so that others will come to respect it as your work. And yes, some of you may have a flexible enough schedule where you could put your writing off until later if something comes up.
For me, that's largely untrue. I have a set writing time six days a week. It's largely unchangeable. So if something interrupts my writing time, I don't get another chance that day to sit down and do it. That's why I guard it with my life.
If I had my druthers (is that really a word?), I would write from my first sip of coffee until lunch time. Morning's my best time, and it's staggering to think how much I might accomplish if I could maximize my brain's freshest hours. Alas, it doesn't work that way for me. I do have a mini-goal of 100-words-before-breakfast each morning, and today I actually topped 300 before moving on to this blog post. But oh, if only I could keep going!
What about you? What's your best time of day? If you could fashion your day completely around your writing, when would you write?
Dreams are good, yes?
For me it's 7-10 every morning and 8-12 every night. AKA up to the minute I leave for work and from the minute I get back.
ReplyDeleteBut I'm not obsessed... :/
I think I do my best in the mornings, too, but it takes me a while to ramp up to speed. I usually spend too much time catching up on blogs, hockey scores, e-mails, news of the world, etc. when it might be better to dive right into writing.
ReplyDeleteAround 10ish in the morning! I like to wake up at 9, drink my coffee, catch up on the internet goings-on, and then dive into writing.
ReplyDeleteAlas, my days rarely work out like that...
Definitely 9 till noon. Which I used to do with nary a care in the world, till I had kids. Now I peck at every free minute--and I mean minute.
ReplyDeleteI like to write late at night, after everyone has gone to bed and the house is silent. The traffic noises are basically absent, too. I think the dark around me isolates me enough to help me focus more sharply on the job at hand.
ReplyDeleteYes! That's one of my New Year's Resolutions--to FIERCELY protect my creative time. I'm trying hard to avoid the guilt monster who keeps telling me I SHOULD be volunteering at my kids' schools, etc.
ReplyDeleteI'm going to quit "shoulding" all over my self in 2012!
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Great thoughts, Authoress!
ReplyDeleteIt pretty much destroys me, but my best writing time is around midnight to 3 am. Other people are awake during the day. Talk about distraction! ;)
Oh my gosh, I would write all day long if I could. I think my problem lies not in protecting my writing time, but getting away from the computer and actually living life so I have something fun to write about.
ReplyDeleteOh, this is a good one...
ReplyDelete4:30 am, with the strongest coffee possible. There's something magic about that time of day.
Also, when I get home from my Big-Girl job, between 5-7pm, I seem to have these scenes that have percolated all day long that just have to jump out onto the page.
Because I have an office job with a lot of free time where I sit and stare at the computer waiting for other people to check their schedules, I get a lot of work done on my own writing in little bits and pieces through the day. My favorite, though, is definitely getting up, making coffee, and getting to just write. I get most of my big chunks of text out during weekends and days off, and use the in-between times at my day job for editing. It's not ideal, but it works.
ReplyDeleteIdeally, all I would have to do, all day, would be write in the morning and edit in the afternoon.
An unlimited supply of coffee wouldn't hurt, either.
I write best when I'm fresh, so generally 5am to whenever the steam runs out or I have to stop and get ready for work.
ReplyDeleteI have more time in the evenings, but no mental clarity. After a full day of writing at the day job, I'm brain dead when I get home.
I just started a new job that sucks up more of my early morning, so I might try to find a good time to sneak in some writing during the work day, like the lunch hour, and see how it goes.
Whenever I wake until noon.
ReplyDeleteAnd dreams are where it all comes from, yes.
At night. 10 PM until midnight or 1 or even 2, and I just want to write. The comments about 'should' happen, plot holes get filled, and things work out. I'd even say it starts at 8 PM someday.
ReplyDeleteWhich is probably why McDonalds loves to schedule me the 5 PM-1 AM shift, and I need the money for tuition too badly to change my availability (from 'anytime' to 'not these hours').
Morning is best for me too, but I warm up by doing the morning crossword and reading a chapter in the latest book on writing (this week, I'm reading Ursula LeGuin's STEERING THE CRAFT). I generally sit down around 9am and write until I've finished my 1500 word quota (or 2:30pm, whichever soonest).
ReplyDeleteWow, no one has babies? I have to write during naptime. Ugh. And if/when my 18 month old doesn't feel like napping, I can't write. It makes me crazy. Next year he will be in 'school' two days a week and I will fiercely protect those two days to write. Other than that, it's only when insomnia strikes, or after the wee ones are sleeping (if I'm not too zonked). When my husband asked me what I wanted for Christmas? You guessed it, TIME TO WRITE! :)
ReplyDeleteOh, what I'd have given for an Adult Snow Day today! I wish I could have worked from home instead of having to slog through Toronto's first real horrible snow-dump. Uhg, and then I have to reverse slog to get home. :(
ReplyDeleteIn my mind I am wrapepd in a warm blanket with a cup of tea and a laptop, cuddled into the corner of the sofa.
My best time of day to write is late afternoon to early morning. I'm best when it's dark out. If I could, I would live a nocternal life, get up late and do my day-light-tasks in the early afternoon and then write. But, unfortunately, the Real World doesn't allow for that, because there's these things called JOBS that happen at 9am. :P
So, generally I write on Sundays. From the moment I wake up to the moment I sleep, Sundays are a writing day, and I try to do little else. I prefer huge chunks of time to little nibbles here and there.
When I was drafting and again when doing the first major round of revisions, my muse woke me up crazy early (5:00), and then I worked with minimal breaks until school pick up time around 2:00. After a few weeks I started getting sleep deprived and often needed weird naps, like 10:30 in the morning. In many ways it was like having a newborn.
ReplyDeleteHmmm... I'm not a morning person. The mojo isn't strong enough, not awake enough in the early a.m. So I tend to make my way with progress after I've put Chipmunk down for bedtime. Then, I won't have the "Mom, can I" or "Mom where is" interrupting me.
ReplyDeleteIf I had my druthers (still not sure if that is a word but it works) I'd send my kiddo off to school, sip on a hot cup of green tea, then burn the rapids on my keyboard until it's time to pick up Chipmunk. But, I don't have my druthers at this time...but working on it :-)
I'm a morning person also. By noon, I'm thinking nap. And if I get unexpectedly interupted, that's it for me. I have a hard time getting back.
ReplyDeleteAnd yes, dreams do come true. My book "Breathless" was released today.
Once I get started, I seem to write new material best at night, often writing late into the night on weekends. Editing things I've already written, on the other hand works best in the morning. I guess I'm neither a morning or an evening person and should probably aim for writing in the afternoon - lol.
ReplyDeleteI write three days a week while my youngest is at preschool. 10 AM until 2:30 PM.
ReplyDeleteI wish I could do more, but my writing ends up disjointed when I try to craft something with kids and husband around.
Sometimes I pretend I'm taking a bath when really I'm just sketching out a scene. Ooo, ninja writing. I'm totally sneaky.
If I had the choice (read: if we won the lottery and I quit my job and do whatever I wanted, lol), I would write in the morning ... right after I checked my email and facebook and twitter, that is. ;) But yeah, mornings work better for me. I think I've gotten too old for staying up late at night (yeah, I've become a boring wimp). For now I settle for after work writing sessions.
ReplyDeleteI write best early in the early morning. Then I work at the day jobbe for 8 hours, have the second shift (kids, house, etc) and maybe get another hour in at night from 8-9:00 p.m. On the weekend, I write for two hours in the morning at a local coffee shop and maybe another hour at night. Maybe 15-16 hours a week.
ReplyDeleteI used to fantasize about quitting my job to write full time and wondered if I'd experience writer's block. I went on a 3-day writer's retreat and wrote from 8:00 a.m. until 10:30 p.m. with two one hour breaks for lunch and supper. I loved it and realize I could write for a living if I had the means.
It's not so much morning or evening, but more of just needing a stretch of uninterrupted time.
ReplyDeleteI don't start unless I know I can have at least two hours.
Once I'm interrupted (by a phone call, hunger,etc.) I just can't get back into it. It's like "the spell" is broken.