Finding Your Comfort

A couple of months ago I inherited a computer from my mother that sat unused in her garage for some time. I had helped her upgrade some time last year and there it sat, unloved and unused in the cold, dark garage. I had wondered if it would work and decided to bring it home after my last visit. My original plan for it was to set it up as a file server, intending to get all of my work files off of my laptop and onto it so I can access them remotely from anywhere on my property with the laptop.  After all, what would happen if my laptop ever got stolen or lost? Sure I had a backup but still, I don’t want some of the stuff on it falling into the wrong hands.

So that’s what I did. When I brought it home I set it up in my office, transferred everything over from the laptop and started working on it instead. And there sat my laptop, under the desk, lone and forgotten like the computer I had saved from my mother’s garage. I pulled it out the other day and fired it up to write the sixth installation of my serial, The Things and realized something. In the time I’ve had the desktop set up (and thus neglected my laptop) I haven’t written a damned thing.

In December I wrote and posted a haiku every day to my blog, but that didn’t really count as writing. Those were just quick little quips that didn’t take me all of a minute to write. I hadn’t been able to sit down and write a single thing of meaningful length in all that time. So I tried. I tried writing two different stories and as I sat there at my office chair, staring at my computer screen with the large window beyond giving me glimpses of life outside, not the first thought ever came into my mind. I couldn’t write at all.

When I took the laptop out into my living room and plopped down in my easy chair, I pumped out that sixth installation in less than half an hour. And I’ve finally figured out what my problem was: comfort. I’ve read in many places advice on how to write and the majority of them overwhelmingly suggest a structured space to sit down and write, much like my office with a desk, chair and dedicated computer. Here’s the caveat: everything I’ve ever written has been written on my laptop, either in my easy chair in the living room, on the deck out back while sitting in the lounger or at a park bench during lunch (in the back seat of my truck on rainy days).

The secret to writing (the secret of transcribing a story in your head onto the written page) isn’t structure – maybe it is for some and maybe they really believe that because it’s been ground into their psyche – it’s comfort. If your comfort is at a desk, so be it. If your comfort is elsewhere, so be it. Whatever it may be, find your comfort and let the words flow.

Originally posted 2011-01-21 12:33:47. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

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