Wednesday, March 19, 2008 | by nathan

We Are Here To Be Writers

One of my favorite bloggers, The Palinode, marked the five-year-and-two-month anniversary of his blog by sorta throwing the gauntlet down at himself, challenging himself to be a better writer.

I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately, as I constantly get frustrated with myself for not dedicating as much time to my writing as I should. Life gets in the way, you see, as it tends to do. Bills have to be paid, work has to be done, dogs have to be walked, and that Whole Situation at the gym must be attended to, lest the Whole Situation just above the waist of my pants gets fatter. Also, I have a guy that I love to whom I enjoy paying attention.

All these things - and my own deeply-felt need to procrastinate - stand between me and my dream of being a full-time writer. I wonder sometimes the degree to which this blog does the same thing, though I enjoy the whole endeavour so much that I don’t see giving it up any time soon.

But having a novel halfway done that you can’t seem to find time for feels a whole lot like being constipated. This weekend I started thinking about this story I’m trying to write and really doubting myself; Bad Mind kicked in, letting me know how incredibly infantile the story is and how it’s going to be ridiculed from Day One, provided it ever gets out, which it won’t, because it’s crap.

I’ve transitioned past that now and am currently trying to be more intentional about making time and space for writing. This has been complicated by the fact that our house is a wreck in the wake of our IKEA orgy - there are cardboard boxes and bubble wrap and hand-drawn instructions everywhere, not to mention last week’s laundry that hasn’t been put away, two dogs who are bursting with life and energy and a Nightline profile of Barack Obama as well as last night’s episode of Jericho I have yet to see.

Life gets in the way, sometimes, kiddies, but I’m bound and determined not to let it. If I have to, tonight I’ll stay up way past my bedtime, and even if I only write 500 words at least I’ll be able to say I did something, today, in pursuit of the dream.