I am a writer. Naturally, making time to write is my top priority, one of them anyway. In addition, I have an astoundingly talent for discovering things which are absolutely critical to accomplish before I can get to my top priority of writing. I have been holding writing as my top priority for several weeks now meanwhile I have planned a Girl Scout camping trip, had a small mental breakdown regarding one child’s decision that I am the worst mom ever and subsequent determination to run away from home (this child is < 10 years old so at worst this child will walk two blocks to a friend’s house), billed twice my usual monthly target, solved many problems for many people, wiped up poop from at least two creatures and vomit from as many (different) creatures, and made a very fine lasagna. Unfortunately, in all this time of holding writing as my absolute top priority, my fingers were unable to grace my keyboard a single time.

Well that’s not true, I did write a sixty page report for a client regarding a very confusing situation for which I conduct a thorough and irreproachable investigation but it is covered by attorney client privilege so it will not be posted on my blog.

It is amazing how productive you can be as a writer! You can sit in your chair to write, pull up your laptop, and immediately fire off ten very critical texts to people in other rooms. You can suddenly recall an item missing from your grocery list, and add it to your grocery list right that second. You can get up to straighten art askew on the wall and vacuum your carpet. It is truly amazing how much a writer accomplishes.

But writers are not merely machines of efficiency. Writers are artists. As a writer, you can sit in a chair with a cup of coffee thinking about good things to write. For variety, you can go for a walk and think about the many things you will write about, rehearsing in your head some fantastic lines you will eventually put to paper. You can even meditate on the very important revelations gleaned from your ordinary life wiping up poop and vomit, which is such a wonderful writerly thing to do. It is such a joy to be a creative, day-dreaming artistic type!

All of this work preceding the writing takes a heavy toll, which is why often just before you get to the point where you start writing sentences, committing a carefully curated selection of insightful daydreams to a real piece of paper or electronically simulated version thereof, using actual words with letters and not simply the imagined words in your mind, you realize you are very tired from all this work and need to engage in some self-care before you can reasonably be expected to pick up the very challenging, laborious work of writing. A glass of wine? Or if you are a very healthy sort of person, perhaps an early bedtime. So you can wake up and write in the morning. That’s such a brilliant idea. What a dedicated writer you are!

What luck! A child awakes in the night to vomit and you get to hold back her hair and wipe her mouth and enfold her in your arms and whisper to her that you are there for her. She nestles in close, comforted by your very presence. This is truly the essence of life, and you are living it right now.

It will also make a great story when you sit down to write about it. The next day, that is, not in the morning. Naturally, after being up in the night you must do the responsible thing and allow your body a little time to recover. After all, it is quite a strenuous calling to be a writer!