Periodically I have…

Periodically I have conversations which go like this:

"So what do you do?"
"I'm a writer."
"Gosh, I always wanted to be a writer. But I wouldn't have the discipline to actually write anything. How do you do it?"
"I don't know. I just go to the cafe, open up my laptop, and start writing."

And sometimes it's like that. It is. But then there are the weeks like this week, where every single morning I've woken up planning to write, and I get through every day without writing anything at all. Except in this journal, I suppose, which doesn't count. I don't even manage to open the file I'm supposed to be working on.

I go through my day, doing errands, filing things, getting more and more irritated with myself, feeling an irrational anxiety build that makes it even more difficult to open up the file and start writing. A sense of 'after all this build-up, I'd better write something really good.' Which is ridiculous. And yet here I am, not writing. Argh.

At least I'm reading a good book in between and during failing to write. Murder in the Pettah, by Jeanne Cambrai, a well-written murder mystery with a sort of Agatha Christie flavor, set in Colombo, Sri Lanka. Entertaining, compelling.

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *