1. No dishes to wash
2. No laundry begging to be washed, dried, folded, put away
3. No TV to tempt me
4. Yummy soy green tea latte
5. People around me
6. People who talk to me about my writng like the gentleman today:
“So did you finish writing in your diary?”
Diary? Huh? Why assume it’s a diary?
I shake my head as I pack up my bag. “No. I’m actually writing a novel.”
Oh, God. Why did I say that?
“A novel? Really?”
I brace myself for the inevitable questions. The proof that I do what I say I do. But it doesn’t come.
“What kind of novel? Mystery?”
“No. More literary fiction, a family drama.”
He nods his head. “That’s great.”
“Yeah. It is.”
He gets a call and I finish packing up and as I leave he waves. I wave back carrying the pages I wrote there in the back booth of my coffee shop today, silently blessing the man for acknowledging the fact that I am writing a novel without asking for proof of it in the form of who’s my agent? where can he buy my book? has he ever heard of me? I’m a writer because I wrote today. I’m a writer who wrote today.
Another classic response to “I’m writing a novel,” is, “Oh, I’ve often thought I could write a novel if I had the time”.
Yes! And I just stumbled across this one:
The late novelist Laurie Colwin was once examined by a doctor who, by way of making conversation, asked what she did for a living. When Colwin told him, the doctor effused, “Really! I’ve been thinking of writing a book myself.”
“That’s nice,” Colwin replied. “I’ve been thinking of performing brain surgery.”