I had my day planned out: I would write until 1, then go to the gym, then go get the kids.
The day started a little weird: I went to Starbucks, which was packed. The giant handicapped table near the power outlets had one guy at it. So I said, “Can I sit here?”
“Sure, sure,” he said, and he moved his stuff out of the way so I would have more space.
I put my coffee down and started unpacking my things to get working.
“What kind of coffee did you order?” he asked, pulling my cup of coffee away.
“What?” I said. I reached for my coffee.
“What did you order? I need to get you another one. I wasn’t paying attention and I drank your coffee.”
To the best of my knowledge, since I began hanging out in cafes in 1986, that’s the first time that’s ever happened.
“Grande Americano, no room,” I said.
A few minutes later he came back with my new coffee (undrunk, I hoped) and a table nearby opened up, so I moved to it.
And then no writing occurred.
(Shortly thereafter, an actual handicapped person came in and asked if they could have that table, so that guy ended up moving to the table next to mine.)
How could that be? On Sunday, when I’d had some writing time, I’d written lots. I’d left myself a cliffhanger. I knew what the next scene had to be.
Nothing happened. I wrote one sentence, practically hacking the words out of stone. The next sentence was hiding, somewhere, afraid to come out.
Oh no.
At 12:30 I finally decided I would go to the gym, work out, get the blood flowing… I checked my phone.
Four calls from Sophia. I hadn’t heard my phone once. Stupid Starbucks music system.
She wasn’t feeling well and wanted to go home. So instead of going to the gym, I went to the school, picked her up, took her home. She went upstairs to lie down. I opened my computer.
Couldn’t write.
Tried playing Tropico 3.
Hated every scenario I tried.
Read a friend’s story to send some feedback. Thought perhaps this might not be the best day for that, because nothing else seemed to be happening. Sent it anyhow.
Sophia came down an hour later to get some lunch.
One of Darin’s great gifts (or strengths, or abilities, or whatever) is that he can concentrate through anything. I can’t. I know I should work on that. But if one of the kids is home, around for any reason, only half of my concentration is present. (And it hadn’t exactly shown up earlier in the day, anyhow.)
I finally called it a day at about 3:30 or 4. I played some Civilization IV. The civ I built annoyed me and I quit the game.
Some days it just doesn’t pay to get started.
You’re really making me look forward to the writing life. Is there a version of the “It Gets Better” videos for writers?
BTW, I would have drank your whole Grande Americano, no room. It’s one of the more consistent and palatable beverages at Starbucks (or Peet’s).
Did he make an honest mistake? It almost sounds like a pickup line.
Some days are better than others for writing. Since Sunday went so well, I really thought yesterday would too. And then…nothing.
I highly highly highly recommend PLANNING. Know what you’re going to write in this chapter, know what the overall arc of the book is. Seat-of-the-pants stuff might work for some, but I honestly believe many more people crash and burn because they haven’t the foggiest what they’re going to write next.
Did he make an honest mistake? It almost sounds like a pickup line.
(comic book guy)Worst. Pickup. Line. Ever.(/comicbookguy)
No, he seemed like he was completely on his own planet in his work–he was an Indian guy with a ton of very weighty tomes scattered around as he was working. I’m pretty sure his tipoff was that I had coffee, not tea.
Of course, I was never very clueful about pickup lines when I was younger, so who knows.
I realize it didn’t happen at the same time, but if I saw a woman sitting in a café drinking a plain Americano and playing Civilization IV, I’d think we were twins, then (maybe) try to flirt with her.
Ha! I actually wasn’t playing Civ IV, I was trying to write (ridiculously unsuccessfully) — it’s too embarrassing to play games in a cafe where everyone can watch me totally waste time like that. No, I had a big empty screen from Scrivener staring at me.