Life Never Gets in the Way

Often when I hear people explain why they haven’t been writing lately (or editing or querying), they’ll sigh, and then justify themselves by saying, “Life got in the way.”

I’ve always nodded sympathetically and agreed with them that it can be so hard to get anything done writing-wise when we have all these other more urgent tasks to attend to. And … dare I say it? … things that are a heck of a lot easier to do than focus on writing.

Photo credit: Glenn Carstens-Peters

But now that I really think about that age-old idiom life gets in the way, I feel the need to counter it with: “Really? Isn’t everything we do part of living? Including writing? I mean, it’s not like we’re tapping away at a keyboard from six feet below ground in a cemetery—unless we’re a particularly inspired gravedigger.

So the next time you arise from your computer or your notebook to make a phone call, pay a bill, go to a day job so you can pay that bill, care for someone sick, buy groceries, figure out what to make for dinner from those groceries, do your taxes, go on vacation, or walk your dog, remember: all this stuff is an inevitable part of living. There’s no need to make excuses or resent these interfering tasks. Just do them. Enjoy them if you can. Because life isn’t in the way—it is the way. (Yes, even the taxes! I’ve found that if I immerse my mind long enough in those nonsensical numerical calculations, they can become relaxing, almost hypnotic).

Say to yourself: I’m gonna steep myself in this chore of the moment. I’ll fully experience it in present time, including (but definitely not limited to) my writing.

For me, of course, living means walking my dog every day. Multiple times, beginning with a long, vigorous jaunt soon after dawn, before I’ve jotted down a single line. Lately, living has also meant painting the interior of our house, one slow room at a time. And it’s meant digging roots and rocks from the hillside to make space for ten rhododendrons.

While I step through the wet leaves and brush past budding shrubbery in the woods, I smell the moist earth, I listen to the Carolina Wrens and Pine Warblers, and I help my dog search for the perfect-sized stick (i.e., big) that he can carry proudly down the trail.

While I dip the brush into a can or the roller into a tray, I gaze at the silky-creamy texture of the paint and the glistening coat it leaves on the formerly dull, grubby wall. This brings me a pleasure that almost makes the tedium of the wall-cleaning, hole-filling, and trim-taping worth it.

I meant to take a picture of my own paint roller, but never found a time when I wasn’t covered with paint in order to do it. Photo credit: Callum Hill

While I heave a pickaxe at a stubborn rock in that tenth rhododendron hole, I endure my aching back and wrists and splatters of dirt in my eyes, and enjoy the satisfaction of the pick slipping beneath the rock, jiggling it loose so I can fit my gloved fingers around it and heave it out. Space at last for a young plant to be freed from its pot, so its roots can begin to explore the musty, mushroomy loam, and its leaves and buds can plumpen and brighten.

Like Frederick the Mouse, I store away these thoughts, feelings, and sensations I experience in the non-writing world. And when I am able to sit in my office once again with a few free hours beckoning, I’ll draw out the memories. The colors, scents, sounds, frustrations, tedium, sadness, satisfaction, and joy. Always the joy.

Simply one of the greatest picture books ever.

For to be a good writer requires one thing above all else: an appreciation of this incredible, complex planet and our lives on it. Life, in all its ugliness and beauty, is the way.

Happy Tales!