On the writing life

I recently spoke with a would-be writer who had produced something less than 20,000 word, the first he had written as a writer. He wanted to get a publisher to tell him if his words were any good or if he should just hang it up. Less then 20,000 words. He contacted four publishers and was ultimately referred to The Queue. I spoke to him about the writing life.

The writing life is what writers like to write about when they aren't writing what they really want to be writing or should be writing. Those who can, do; those who are stuck, write about whatever they can, the writing life being a favorite.

The writing life means something different to every writer but one thing is probably common to us all. Writing defines our lives in ways that demand a tremendous sacrifice of time and money. We give up time with spouses, kids and friends to devote hours everyday to writing. If all is going well, we crave the time spent writing. We have created a habit, an addiction, that must be fed. Dry spells mean we loose the habit and we are often despondent when this happens.

I live with a writer and I call myself a writer between long periods of dormancy. I have three novels on my computer hard drive and have won a couple of significant competitions. I have one publishing credit beyond this blog--a short story published as part of the prize for one of the competitions I won. For a lot of writers, writing demands the time and energy that could be used to pursue other careers. That choice can mean a life on the edge of poverty without savings, without health insurance. Periods of dormancy for me have coincided with periods of seeking to build a career--retail management, computer programming. Being poor gets old.

For twenty years, from the time I decided I would write, I have taken hundreds of hours of classes, spent hundreds of hours reading what a writer needs to read, devoted hundreds of hours in writing groups, reading other writers' work and listening to mine be dissected. I've spend thousands of dollars on classes, on books, on paper and ink, on paid editors to critique my work. I have probably paid hundreds of thousands of dollars on the opportunity costs of choosing jobs that would not interfere with my writing.

A friend once said that being married is a choice one has to make every day--he's a guy of course, most women only have to choose about once a week. I think being a writer is a choice we make everyday. It's a choice we agonize over and when we choose otherwise we feel a profound sense of loss.