When do you write?

[SamScribble]

I was reading an essay by Adam Gopnik in The New Yorker. His subject was ‘Why Anthony Trollope is Trending’ (edition of May 4, 2015). And I was struck by one of his observations: ‘Writing is turning time into language, and all good writers have an elaborate, fetishistic relationship to their working hours.’

My first writing job was with an advertising agency – back in Mad Men days. The hours were 8:30 to 5:00. I went on to work for a couple more agencies where the hours were ‘whatever it takes’. I recall the ‘record’ was 7 am Wednesday until 11 am on Friday – followed by a memorable lunch.

During my ad agency days, I wrote short stories and newspaper columns in my ‘spare time’. This usually meant an hour in the early morning, a couple of hours in the evening, and perhaps half a day in the weekend.

When I took the plunge and went freelance, I began by working every hour that I could. But this didn’t always lead to quality prose. Eventually, I worked out that a ‘good day’ was probably three or four hours writing and four or five hours doing all of the other things that a working writer needs to do. Writing my first proper book, I wrote from 7 am until 11 am each day, seven days a week.

Now that I’m slowing down – and being kept alive by the pharmaceutical industry – I find that it’s hard to put in four hours straight in the morning. Instead, I usually manage a couple of hours in the morning and two or three hours in the afternoon. But when something intervenes to disrupt my schedule, it really affects my ‘production’.

What works for you? Do you have set writing times? Or do you just fit it in when you can?

 

[Desiremakesmeweak]

If it isn't directly research related - which in this case of course, means sex - then life is just an intrusion, really.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

My day is compartmentalized with LIT before dawn with coffee, gardening/shopping next, current events till lunch, writing till 3, reading till supper, writing till 7 or 8, then bed. The after lunch writing is mostly research driven, as opposed to application.

 

[NaokoSmith]

I just fit it in as best I can .

I have to prioritise Piglet, sort out the house and do my other paid job. Also various things like School Governor, leaflet delivering for the Party, attending political meetings, taking afternoon tea ...

So I write whenever I can snatch a long enough spell to make it worth putting pen to paper!

I don't like to write new exciting smut when Piglet is in the house. I get up early and have a chat on the board, do some editing, email a few friends. Then I might have to do some of my paid work in the day. I usually will set aside a day or two in the week ahead: 'By Wednesday I will have done cleaning, sorted out my marking and Piglet will be at an after school club so I will have a couple of hours in which I could turn out a quick chapter. On Thursday morning I should be able to put aside some time to re-read and edit.'

I did snatch early morning time to write a FAWC story while holidaying in a caravan, when I was burning to make the deadline.

It's less finding time and more finding time when I also have clear enough space in my mind to roll out the plot, bring the characters out, have a good think about them all and remember where I meant to take them to next. I'm not doing original writing at the moment, as my head is still full of my new home and sorting things out for us here, and my new and more interesting life. At the moment, I'm just re-reading, editing and posting chapters for a novel I wrote a while back, which doesn't take so much time/concentration and can be done when Piglet has gone to bed.

 

[elfin_odalisque]

I agree NS, miaow. Sr had berated me for not posting for years but I haven't got his luxury of being retired. I post from airport lounges, bored teleconferences etc. The stuff I write then I wouldn't even give a 2 to when I reread.

Piglet comes first but it is the same for all of us that try to split things to find a quiet space.

 

[lovecraft68]

6-8 on week nights and 8-9 is spent on either editing something previously written or making a cover or uploading books for sale-all tedious things, but by that time I'm tired enough to have patience to do it.

Nine on is the time with my wife, unless I'm really flowing then I write til whenever.

ON weekends early morning and late afternoon around other things.

 

[MagicaPractica]

Whenever I can, first thing in the morning before work, during lunch at work, scribbled notes when I have an idea at work, in the evening after I've fed the family dinner but before putting the munchkin to bed, notes on my kindle while she's falling asleep, anytime I can on my day off.

 

[PennLady]

I would write during the day when my kids are in school but lately too much has been going on and I don't... but the best time is just when I have time to focus and sit, and that's often hard to come by or fit in.

But when an idea takes hold, I write whenever I can.

 

[sr71plt]

I write best between midnight and 3:00 a.m. If I have editing to do, I do that earlier in the day. There's no morning left after I've gotten up, done my exercises, and had "breakfast."

 

[litfan10]

When I started freelancing I found I wrote best at night.
I would use the day to make xerox copies, make phone calls to editors, interview sources, library research, spend hours in the post office.... it was a lot of fun back before computers and Internet.
Once computers and Internet changed the dynamics, I had to learn how to write on demand at anytime in order to get the jobs I needed in order to pay the bills. That took quite awhile to break my already formed writing habits. Often I got gigs from desperate editors (that really doesn't sound good, does it!?!) to write something that was already due yesterday.
I'm fortunate that I have editors that know I give clean copy fast but also don't mind when they totally rip my work apart to fit whatever they are publishing the piece into for publication. While I'm not eating fillet mignon regularly, at least I'm not eating Ramen noodles (anymore) for my main diet.

 

[soflabbwlvr]

I write during my lunch hour. Mornings are my most productive periods, so those hours are dedicated to work. When I can, I take a two or two and a half lunch break for writing. Afternoons are usually constant telephone calls, so I don't try to write anything then.

 

[slyc_willie]

At night, after everyone else is asleep, usually from 11 PM until 2 in the morning. Sometimes during the day when I have time off and before Little One gets home. But seeing as how most of my writing flows in proportion to the amount of good German or Belgian beer I'm imbibing, most of it occurs at night.

 

[Katiecat]

I write all the time in my head. Sometimes I work on dialogue out loud when I'm alone in the car; if another driver sees me talking to myself, I pretend I'm just singing along with the radio. I work 6:30-4:00 in an office -- once in a while, if I have an idea that is so urgent I have to write it down, I will, but I try to make sure that notebook stays safely in my purse. I would never live it down if I left the notebook on my desk and one of my coworkers opened it, perhaps intending to tear out a sheet of scratch paper, and they got a taste of what goes on in my head.

Hmmm...actually...maybe there is a story idea in that. Anyway...

My "serious" writing is done in the evenings, in between trying to make dinner, clean the kitchen, do laundry, pay bills, and all of the other things that I really should be doing. My husband is also a writer, and we share a huge computer desk and sit typing side by side. Kind of romantic, in a way.

I'm really looking forward to retirement and having more time to write, but I have a few years to go.

 

[lowphat]

I've been retired for about fifteen years, but I still take on contract work here and there. (I do short run and prototype polyurethane parts.) So I have plenty of time to write when I want. I do most of the cooking, and my share of the cleaning, but aside from that, I write.

 

[lovecraft68]

I write all the time in my head. Sometimes I work on dialogue out loud when I'm alone in the car; if another driver sees me talking to myself, I pretend I'm just singing along with the radio. I work 6:30-4:00 in an office -- once in a while, if I have an idea that is so urgent I have to write it down, I will, but I try to make sure that notebook stays safely in my purse. I would never live it down if I left the notebook on my desk and one of my coworkers opened it, perhaps intending to tear out a sheet of scratch paper, and they got a taste of what goes on in my head.

Hmmm...actually...maybe there is a story idea in that. Anyway...

My "serious" writing is done in the evenings, in between trying to make dinner, clean the kitchen, do laundry, pay bills, and all of the other things that I really should be doing. My husband is also a writer, and we share a huge computer desk and sit typing side by side. Kind of romantic, in a way.

I'm really looking forward to retirement and having more time to write, but I have a few years to go.

The good thing is these days with blue tooth and being able to call through your car seeing someone talking in a car doesn't meaN they look crazy anymore.

My wife writes as well, but we have separate offices. We could never work side by side. I think I could, I just crank music up and write, but she would be distracted and I would get

"hey, how you making out, hey what are you doing...." all the time.

 

[wakingDown]

I don't sleep well, so get up in the early afternoons since my sleep cycle is wrecked. I write most of the afternoon almost everyday now that I'm back at it. I have little else I can do, so it tends to dominate my time.
I do editing stuff when I first get up, after going through all the physical therapy crap. Stretches and getting my leg to work again does a pretty good job of waking me up and my meds aren't zombifying me yet, so I'm clear-headed enough to go over what I wrote the previous day and untangle the linguistic quagmire that I hatched in my opioid haze.
Some days I draw instead of write, but that is still pretty hard on my hands despite the reconditioning, so I still focus on writing. I take breaks every hour or so to let my wrists rest, but I keep a pretty steady pace throughout the day.
Depending on how little I want to sleep each day, I write until I simply have to give up and sleep. Usually I lay down around midnight when the night meds start working, but I'll keep making notes (that make less and less sense as as the tranquilizer kicks in more) until I actually lose consciousness, typically around four or five.
A lot of the poetry I write gets done in the late evening, when my mind is really starting to unravel. That's when abstract thinking isn't easier, but simply how I am currently operating. I try not to do anything important around the house in the evenings, as things get a little weird by then. I've found my keys in the freezer a few times. No need to try to figure out the bills when I have a hard time figuring out where the keys go. And no, I don't drive when I'm like that. I only drive in the first couple hours I'm awake if I have to drive at all. It hurts to drive, so I avoid it to begin with. I don't need to do it when I can't think.
This ended up being longer than I thought it would. Sorry.

 

[Katiecat]

The good thing is these days with blue tooth and being able to call through your car seeing someone talking in a car doesn't meaN they look crazy anymore.

My wife writes as well, but we have separate offices. We could never work side by side. I think I could, I just crank music up and write, but she would be distracted and I would get

"hey, how you making out, hey what are you doing...." all the time.

Oh, my husband and I do that to each other all the time. He has been on a kick of making miniature metal models and he wanders off periodically to work on them, then brings them out to show me his latest progress. Or he reads quotes from his current story to me, and I express appropriate outrage at the deplorable behavior of his characters and give my opinions that they are getting just what they deserve (his characters are rarely well-behaved). I read passages out loud to him, too, to see how they sound, to juggle phrasing and word choices, and we use each other as living thesauri. I also write a lot of political and religious essays, and he is quite tolerant of my soapbox/pulpit. We are remarkably quite tolerant of each other overall. Isn't that the secret to a lasting marriage?

 

[GriffyD_Boy]

I write whenever I can. It mostly comes down to taking the occasional quick break while I'm at work though. I write using pen and paper and weekends are when I take time to transcribe what I've written on paper to computer.

 

[legerdemer]

Whenever I can, generally in the afternoon, evening or late night, and never as long as I'd like. I think about stories as I do other things, but my memory is bad enough that I have to write notes to myself, even cryptic, to make anything except the most general ideas stick.

 

[DreamCloud]

More often than I should. Life suffers when your mind leaves reality and embeds itself into a story. Real work becomes the distraction and friends become irritants. Good thing I never gave heroin a try.

 

[49greg]

I'm among the retired, so aside from chores that must be done my day is pretty much my own. I don't have a set time to write, and I haven't actually finished a story in nearly six months, but I have been writing on and off for the last two or three, and have noticed that most of the writing is during the morning, after I've breakfasted and walked the dog.

 

[sr71plt]

I'm among the retired, so aside from chores that must be done my day is pretty much my own. I don't have a set time to write, and I haven't actually finished a story in nearly six months, but I have been writing on and off for the last two or three, and have noticed that most of the writing is during the morning, after I've breakfasted and walked the dog.

Hmmm. If you have a dog to walk, I'm not sure you claim to be retired.

 

[litfan10]

I just realized my best answer should have been when I'm not in the Author's Hangout or Twitter......
Actually, I find unless I've got a serious flow going on I often bounce between writing and AHing, like right now I'm writing a column and playing here. SOmehow it works for me.
Happy writing everybody.

 

[robertreams]

Midnight until 3 or 4 A.M., in my own office, naked if it is warm enough.

 

[_Lynn_]

I don't have set hours for writing because that doesn't work well with the bipolar. So I write whenever I want to, however long the mood strikes, until the words don't flow anymore. If a story falls together and I don't have appointments or other plans, I'll keep going through the night.