Writers Need Quiet to Write … Right?
When you and your spouse have adjoining home offices.
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Alex is fairly patient with me.
I give him a lot of credit for this. Having been single most of our lives, we each have our unique foibles. He puts up with my compulsions, whirlwind of activities, projects scattered hither and yon about both the house and yard. Where his patience fails is being home for seven months (and counting!) and working ten steps away from this writer.
Writers are soloists. We don’t (I don’t) generally like to be around other people except on our terms. And sometimes on Tuesdays. It’s not that we only write when the muse strikes — it’s ridiculous waiting on her to show up. She is on her own schedule and trust me, she doesn’t care one iota about what I want. We write all the time, even when those words aren’t magically appearing on paper or on the screen. We write in our heads, in our beds, and sometimes still using lead.
I had to throw a rhyme in there to see if you’re paying attention. Yes? Okay, I’ll continue.
Quiet on the set, please!
Writers need solitude. Serenity. Or noise on our terms. Sometimes the background of a murder mystery I’ve already seen is white noise, blocking out those ever-enticing birds, “Come outside, RoseMary, come outside!”
I can ignore the birdsong about 90% of the time. What is harder to ignore is my husband.
We should have, in the early days of cohabitating, instituted the rule a friend has — no talking unless you are in the same room. Of course, that would encourage Mr. Interrupter to open my office door to talk to me more than he already does.
Sigh.
I tried explaining that because we writers live in imaginary worlds chock-full of characters and plots and settings, each time we are jolted out of writing, it is like watching your first ever episode of Fringe (remember that great SciFi show?). You get up to grab snacks and come back to find yourself in an alternate reality where the characters look the same, but hey, endearing John Noble aka Walter is a beast in the this world versus our earth.
