All my life I've been telling myself that someday in the future I would have more time to write. Someday I wouldn't be so busy, or have so many demands on my time, and then I could really get started.
That day finally came for me when my children went back school this year. My youngest entered second grade, and for the first time since he started school, I wouldn't be teaching, working, or taking a class. I would have six glorious hours every day to sit in front of my computer and type.
I tried it for one day. And I was miserable.
How could it be? For years I'd thought that if I could only write for six hours a day, uninterrupted, then I would be truly happy and produce the masterpiece of literature that I had always dreamed of. But now that I had all that uninterrupted time, it didn't feel right. It reminded me of what happened in college when I got that highly-prized internship at Los Alamos National Lab. I discovered that I didn't like spending all day with my data, my code, and my computer. I couldn't take the isolation. I needed people.
Did that mean that I couldn't be a writer?
Couldn't be a writer? Now just wait a minute! During all those years of college, then babies, then teaching, as my family moved eight times in sixteen years, I wrote five novels! I'm already a writer. I've always had time to write. That's because I made time to write. And what I wrote was good. Why did I think that there was some future, over the rainbow, in which I would really get started? I had started. I started the day in third grade when I wrote my first story not because of any school assignment but just because I had a story in me that had to come out.
I want to write. I need to write. But there are so many other things I want to do as well. I need to live. So what did I do? I signed up for a sailing class. And when I was offered an unexpected teaching job, I took it gladly. There will be time to write. There will always be time to write. I will make time to write, just like I always have. Writing good stories is a way of sharing my talents and serving others, but so is helping my neighbor move, or working on the elementary school play, and I want to be able to keep a balance and do all sorts of good things with my life.
Keep writing.
Someday is Now.
Ha! I needed this. I'm still waiting for "my time" because I have three small children. But well...maybe it's now:) Thanks.
ReplyDeleteThanks for reading, Jessie. I remember when I had three small children I learned how to type while nursing. I can't imagine doing that now! I also spent a lot of time at the playground, sitting on the bench in the shade, dreaming up stories. Now I don't have much time to daydream, not with three teenagers, two younger ones, and fifty college students to take care of.
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