Writers That Complain Should Be Roundly Mocked, Beaten

So I took my first non-emergency day off yesterday from this blog, which is my “day job.” Holy mackerel. I went to some libraries and did research! I went to cafes-cafes that didn’t have wifi-and wrote! I took a nap in the middle of the day! So here is my mini-revelation. You know how you have writer friends who don’t have another job who are all, oh, my book, my book is due in four months, I have to write this boooook and are all torturey and tortured? Please laugh at them all the time.

Now, I’m sure one’s mileage will vary if people have to write a book that is funny (no one can be funny all the time) or historically illuminating (research is demanding, and making it breathe is probably hard!) and it’s probably really crazy to have to make up things for fiction that are interesting or sensical (not a word). And I’m sure it’s very hard to write a very good book. But most people don’t do that, and you can’t make yourself write a “good” book really, or else everyone would do it, so it’s not really an issue!

And, to be fair, long-term project management is stressful! And book-publishing is weird for authors because you get some money and then you get some money like 18 months later and then maybe some more money in another year, and so managing that financially is really eye-crossing.

But really, apart from that, which, you tell me: is that all worse or better than working in an office and filing your TPS reports?

So you get up in the morning and make some coffee and read some things that give you ideas and you take a shower and have some ideas and you jot down some notes and write a few chapters and then you break for a snack and then you write a few thousand words and then it’s only time for lunch.

What the hell, people? That’s not work! That’s like getting massaged on the lido deck of the Good Ship Unicorn while magical fairies feed you meringues.

Now, you’re totally allowed to sympathize with all book writers after their first book is published and no one wants to talk to them and they have nothing to do and, you know, have to get jobs blogging or teaching or whatever. Because that shit is a lot closer to being work. Though I imagine it still beats assembling walk-in refrigerators and doing oil changes or writing about celebrities.