SquarePeg Books

When you think of the term working writer, what does that look like to you? What do you think it is supposed to look like? Do you see yourself as a working writer or aspiring or hobbyist, and if latter two, what does that look like?

To me, a working writer hits their goals daily – be that hours worked, word count, research, marketing, whatever. You have a dedicated sacred space in which work is done, and interruptions are few and far between.

A working writer works on their writing. That’s their job, their small business. They might be their only employee, which makes it harder to fake a sick day to their boss, but if you don’t work, you don’t get paid.

I am not a working writer.

At this point in time, I am a slacker aspiring writer.

I say this because I am also a full-time Mom.

Admittedly, I don’t have employment on top of that, but quite honestly, my full-time Mom gig isn’t about bon-bons and watching my stories on TV, either.

It’s hard to carve out uninterrupted time when your work space is crammed behind a couch in the TV room with a hung sheet acting as a divider. For some reason, when you tell your spouse it’s distracting to have the TV on while you work, even while you’re wearing headphones, all they do is turn down the volume a touch. It’s hard dedicating time to even sketch out a scene when you need one ear open for the inevitable “Mom?”. It’s challenging to edit when you know, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that you will be interrupted because of Crisis #37–be that the WiFi crashing or one of the kids is having a small breakdown because of Reason G.

It is intensely aggravating to finally work yourself up to writing again, to getting into the groove of it, only to have to stomp the brakes on everything and come to a hard stop for several weeks/months at a time because one or the other of the kids desperately needs all the support you can give.

Of course, I’ve seen authors brag about pecking out romance novels while breastfeeding one child and homeschooling 4 others (No exaggeration. She literally said she does that.). Others meet their production goals daily, despite their chronic illness that drags them down and eats their brains and bodies alive. Still more hold down full time jobs and then work in the evenings, cranking out a novel every 8 months with that schedule. “It can be done,” they say. “You just have to want it.”

Sure, sometimes I dash off a note regarding a bit of research information I stumble across. Sometimes I even sketch out the bare bones of a random scene.

But you need time and space and breath to stitch all that together.

And somehow, I think it’s going to be a while longer yet before I get that kind of flexibility to immerse myself in writing again.

And it isn’t the first time that I’ve thought “Maybe I don’t want it enough.”.

Those doubts can be crippling. The lack of support around one, be it spoken or action, is draining. And exhausting. Yes, I can build despite all that. I’ve done it before. But it took a lot longer than it should have because of those demands, those doubts, those anxieties nibbling at my brain and sucking away at my energy.

“You have a lot of motherfuckers to prove wrong.”

Spite can carry you a long way, but it’s more like a spare tire–they work for a while, but they aren’t intended to carry the whole car for more than a hundred miles or so. You need more than spite to keep you going.

Check out the Insecure Writer’s Support Group to see more writers dish about their concerns, their solutions to various problems, or just general metrophobia.