Day 5: The Writing Life

First of all, applause for my fellow blog goddesses, writers, and friends Amanda, Ami, and Monica who aren’t just staying true to this post-a-day challenge, but who are also cranking out some beautiful, poignant, and hilarious tales.

Special thanks to Monica for her amazing post on overcommitment.

And for calling us all bitches in the sweetest way possible.

There is almost always something else you can do rather than write.

Let me get specific as I am one who makes her living from writing for others.

There is almost always something else you can do rather than write for yourself. Laundry. Masonry. Animal husbandry. The list goes on.

H. Jackson Brown, Jr. (author of Life’s Little Instruction Book, remember that?) wrote,

“Don’t say you don’t have enough time. You have exactly the same number of hours per day that were given to Helen Keller, Pasteur, Michaelangelo, Mother Teresa, Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Jefferson, and Albert Einstein.”

Ouch, H. Jackson. Take it easy. It’s Monday.

But I ask you.

Did Michaelangelo have to sift through 50+ emails about timeshare opportunities, male enhancement, and casual sex in my area inquiries each morning? (Oh really, it’s just me?)

Did Mother Teresa worry about being mowed down on the streets of Charleston by a college coed in an SUV who’s applying mascara while texting her BFF about some OMG LOL moment while drinking a Red Bull? Nay, I say.

Did Leonardo da Vinci ever even hear of a Kardashian? Methinks not.

This modern age is hard on the gentle soul of a writer. But the glimmer of hope is this: the angsty, I-have-no-fargin’-time-for-this slowly melts away as you write. The beginning is still uncomfortable, in a middle school first dance kind of way. But it’s well worth pushing through, because on the other side of the angst are the words, arranged by you and you alone. And as you read it, you discover that you’ve shared something, and it’s often not the thing you expected to share at all.

That’s the gift. That’s why we write. For that. And for our bitches.