Working While Working
So I got a job finally, huzzah, and I’m out there working. This is probably the kind of job a twenty-something should be doing, rather than an old guy like myself. There’s a lot of wear and tear on the old bones. Despite the bouts of panic-stricken activity, there are moments of waiting and driving. Sometimes, long moments.
Long moments of waiting are actually the main time my writing gets done. Sure, there are long hours in front of a keyboard. The real stuff comes out while I’m doing nothing.
Like all writers (don’t tell me I’m wrong, fellow writers), if I know I have extended waiting periods scheduled, I bring a book to read. I do this at work as well, and in the short time I’ve worked, I’ve gotten through “The Wise Man’s Fear” by Patrick Rothfuss. A weighty tome (and recommended, by the way, if you like epic fantasy), and I have a fat Neal Stephenson up next.
In the shorter periods, or when I can’t read, say when I’m driving, I go into a deeply imaginative state. This is where characters are born, scenes develop, plot dilemmas get repaired. While I occasionally force myself to go somewhere where there’s nothing to do, having the opportunity to do this while I’m getting paid is priceless. Heck, the idea for this blog came about while driving around Berkeley.
Maybe this doing nothing is not the way other writers work. I remember the author character in Stephen King’s “Bag of Bones” described his writing technique as unseen men moving big blocks of ideas around in his subconscious. This isn’t how it works for me. I consciously go to the place in my brain where plots are plotted and dialogue is spoken, and hash everything out.
Sometimes, the “consciously going” also involves physically going—to a quiet place, to a boring place. While the typing part is going on, I don’t mind distractions so much. While the thinking is going on, I need it as quiet and still and non-distracting as possible.
So I’m getting a two-for-one deal on this job, working for money, and doing the real work my compulsions force me to do. Bonus!
At the same time, as I sit and think, I notice people. For the most part, they have headphones on, attached to their mobile devices or whatever. They are distracting themselves as they walk to BART or wait for a bus or whatever they’re up to.
I find it strange, and a little sad, that most people don’t thrive in some rich imaginary world. It makes me wonder if they don’t find their own thoughts as engaging as whatever they’re listening to or viewing in their solitary and claustrophobic existence. Why don’t they have Tess Coopers falling down in something icky, or Victor Sigorskis shooting up inhuman gangsters, or a heist plot running through their heads just slow enough to catch?
It strikes me that maybe I’m the strange one, chasing stories that are created in my own brain, for my personal entertainment, and often for the entertainment of the reading public. Strange or not, I enjoy this pursuit, and wouldn’t trade it, not for the newest phone toy, not for a couple hours at a newly released movie. I have all the interesting stuff I need right here inside the old brain.
