The Occasional Writer or...?

 

To take Edgar Rice Burroughs advice in today's poster, you need to be a certain kind of writer. Let me introduce you to two writers. Samantha is an occasional writer. Veronica is a serious writer. 

Samantha enjoys writing stories and poems. She is also a social butterfly, never saying no to a time to gather with friends. She also loves to shop and hits all the sales in town. Besides those two time drainers, this woman has two children whom she cares for, cooks for, shops for and more. When Samantha has s little free time, she gathers her thoughts and sits at her computer desk to write a new story on her laptop. She becomes absorbed in the project and has her first draft finished just in time to change clothes and meet Glenna for lunch. The next week, she is totally involved with getting summer activities lined up for her children, attending several meetings, and hitting the sales for summer clothes for her kids. It's a month before she gets back to proof and edit the story she wrote. She wonders if she'll ever have time to get the story polished and work on submitting it to a publication.

Samantha is a occasional writer, for sure. She thinks about writing a great deal, but somehow she seldom finds time to actually write. If she's satisfied with the amount of writing she is doing, it's fine to be that occasional writer. She will probably have very few publications to her name. That's alright if she doesn't have the drive or passion to write more often. If she had those two things, she would cut back on her social life and shopping to carve out more writing time. It's her choice.

Veronica is a serious writer who spends a great deal of her time writing essays, stories for kids, poetry, and articles on the craft of writing. She sets time aside for writing but still manages to take care of her two children and have an occasional lunch with friends, or a shopping spree once in a great while. Veronica has a long list of credits in the publishing world. She's also placed in numerous writing contests. She knows that the more she writes, the stronger her writing becomes. 

Veronica is an extrovert, just like Samantha, but she budgets her social time so that she has more hours to write. She is passionate and driven to write. She feels the need to write almost as much as she does to breathe. She gives up some things in order to devote more time to writing. It's her choice.

Neither Samantha or Veronica depends on their writing income to survive. If they did, both would be in big trouble. Even though Veronica is a serious writer, she is still a part time writer. People who write for a living must devote many hours to this occupation just as someone who works in an insurance office or an import-export firm or as the County Treasurer. 

Samantha and Veronica are not real people. Even made up, they are examples of two different kinds of writers. Is your writing world similar to one or the other? Are you satisfied with the time you give to writing? If not, can you figure out how to carve more time for writing out of your busy life? We're all different people, and we should do whatever works for us as individuals. It's your choice.