What’s It Like, Being a Writer?

What’s it like being a writer, you ask? Well, there’s several different aspects to it all, of course. Here’s a quick glimpse into a writer’s head. Watch your step….

That guy's brain is a bag full of cats. You can smell crazy on him.

Writer Wordart

Writer Wordart (Photo credit: MarkGregory007)

Note: This is more than a bit self-mocking. Feel free to laugh and don’t take any of this too seriously.

A Writer’s Mind

“Oh my gosh, this is awesome. I can’t believe I produced this. I even love reading it myself. It’s really good. It needs some polishing, of course. All work does. But this one has a long way to go. It’s garbage, really. Ye gads, it’s awful. Who would ever sit through this? How could I think of putting this out in public, for people to see? With my name on it? It’s like nothing else out there. No one else is doing this. This is really original. People are going to be really surprised by this! It’s so cool! I’m really proud of this! I can’t believe what happens in my head sometimes. I mean, I have really crazy ideas, stuff about magic and history and alternate history and murder and power and sex and power-sex and wow, I’m really twisted. How could I even come up with that? And then write it down? I’m sick, and no one would ever want to read that. It’s trash, and bad trash. Why would I think I could even do this? And for money? I can’t make money at this. It’s a good thing I’m doing it for the love of it. Because I do love it. I can’t wait to get home and get other work done so I can work on writing. It’s so ridiculously awesome to create a world and share it with other people who appreciate it, and they do like it, because it’s good! I’m good at what I do!”

Fast-forward five minutes, and repeat.

A Writer’s Workday

Day job. Day job. Lots of day job. Actually, being self-employed and being a writer (another flavor of self-employed) is really full of conflict, because which self-employed job do I work on right now?

Okay, writing time. But first, writing marketing time. Check Twitter, try to say something brilliant. Um, well, let’s settle for retweeting someone else, then.

Update Facebook? Find something to post on Kindleboards? Any new reviews to share?

Writer's Block 1

Writer’s Block (Photo credit: OkayCityNate)

Blog post. Oops, not exactly relevant, possibly offensive. Post anyway, spent too long on it.

Writing time! Okay, was just about to — drat, what was that awesome line of dialogue I came up with in the car? Was driving, no way to write it down, and it was way better than what I had already. Crud, now I can’t think of anything else….

I’ll remember it eventually. In the meantime, I need to cut 10,000 more words from this thing. /sigh/

A Writer’s Payday

/checks sales reports/ “Hey! I’m up to double-digits in royalties!”

A Writer’s Leisure Time

Writer: “I really liked the characters, so much potential, but I think they needed to pry Save The Cat out of the screenwriter’s hands. I’m all for The Hero’s Journey and stuff, but I shouldn’t be able to count the beats aloud as the movie plays.”

Writer’s friend: “It was gorgeous. Really pretty to watch. We on for another film?”

/another film/

Writer: “Yikes, that movie was terrible. I mean, totally ignoring the insanely-bad science and the complete ret-conning of everything that made the franchise good, the emotional pacing was non-existent, the dialogue was contrived, and there were plot-holes I could drive a Mac truck through.”

Writer’s friend: “I liked the special effects.”

Writer: “No amount of fluff can replace a skeleton. I think the studio owes me ticket money.”

Writer’s friend: “I think you need to see movies with someone else.”

A Writer’s Social Life

“No, I can’t do anything tonight, sorry; I have to work on revisions.”

A Writer Is Recognized on the Street and Asked for an Autograph

….Okay, I made that up.

A Writer’s Playlist

Songs that reflect what it’s like to be a writer:

He was found naked and dead with a smile in his face
A pen and one thousand pages of erased text
— The Poet and the Pendulum, by Nightwish

Songs a writer plays while writing? That’s a whole ‘nother blog post.

A Writer’s Blog

Sheesh, nothing to write about. Again. Maybe I’ll make up something about writers’ quirks. Why did I ever think this was a good idea?

Bookmark the permalink.

4 Comments

  1. What’s funny is that this is an older post I didn’t actually mean to repost, just accidentally did as I was messing with site, but I’m glad it’s appreciated! :D

  2. Who did the cover? I like! :)

Leave a Reply to Nan Van Cancel reply

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