One of the biggest challenges writers seem to face is finding the time to write. If you don’t have the privilege of writing for a living, one must contend with a day job, spouses, kids, pets, or any number of things higher on the priority list than putting word to paper. This month held an extra challenge for me in that I dared to take a vacation. Oh the horror! The blog deadline! The explosion of submissions for critiquing! The book study! Blog editing! Would I ever be able to keep up? The answer, in a word: no.
On the first day of vacation, I let my Twitter followers know that I would try to answer the question: Will a writer write while on vacation? After that, I kept them updated with daily statuses on how things were going telling them each time to ‘Stay tuned.’ Did I write anything? Yes, on the third day I penned a paragraph while sitting on the beach. Yea! On the fifth day I caught up with email, sent out some tweets, and wondered if that counted as writing.
In the end, my writing mind rode the vacation trail and did not create a blog post or anything more than that paragraph on the beach. As I read that sentence, I realize I’m falling into a trap many writers set up for themselves which is to think you are only succeeding if you achieve some arbitrary amount of specific work. The truth is that I did compose something. I also thought about what I might write which is an important part of the process. So, despite being on vacation, I produced this piece on my first day back.
It is, however, two days late to my editor. Will she forgive me and find a way to help me polish it in time for posting on the 24th? Will Part 2 offer interesting and helpful insight on suspense?
Stay tuned…
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