Is there a “best place” to write?
Filed Under (Writing) by Estee on 28-02-2010
I’m taking a break and writing at my desk while Adam plays. We’ve had a difficult weekend with anxiety so I’m taking a moment to permit myself to daydream a bit. Writing the book is a challenge with Adam’s needs. I haven’t showered since Thursday.
I have to admit I’m dreaming of a little white cottage on the beach by the sea. For some reason, I think I’ll just be pumping out the writing there. Isn’t that how we all dream it will “happen,” without the reality that it just takes daily effort and practice? But ah, the dream…. For now I settle for handwriting when traveling. I wrote a novella during my last trip Paris in the coffee shops where no real Parisian would dare to be seen writing. It’s what labels me a true foreigner there, apparently, alongside how I order my coffee and what kind of coffee I order at any particular point in the day. Yet I didn’t care. I loved every minute of it.
I’m interested for all you bloggers out there, when it’s the best time and place for you to write. I’ve got my little white office and I stare out at the street through two thinning pine trees.
ESTÉE KLAR
TORONTO, ONTARIO, CANADA
Writer.Curator of Art. Founder of The Autism Acceptance Project. Mother of Adam. I like to write about our journey, musings, attitudes towards autism.
Ah, I can so relate to the cottage on the beach, mine is a cabin on the lake that exists only in my mind. I retreat there often. And yes, I too imagine words flowing easier in a total state of relaxation that the cabin on the lake would provide.
I get my writing done at the expense of laundry, dishes, and other chores. There is no good time to write for me. I am a mother and have to dry tears, wipe hineys, clean up messes, and prepare snacks all day. That’s only when hubby doesn’t have an errand for me to squeeze into what seems to him like a totally free schedule. Therapy, home school, the dog…it’s always something.
I tend to write in short spurts, for 1-3 days about 2-4 hours a day, then nothing for a week or two. Because it is a memoir some of the material is painful and emotionally draining. I have been trying to commit myself to completing a chapter at a time since I am in the rewrite process now.
If I all of a sudden fell into a huge amount of money then I would hire a nanny, a maid, and a cook. :) Then I could write at my leisure! But if life were that easy I would have nothing to write about would I….
The best place for me to write is a testament to my reality. My office is set up in the basement, where the boys do not typically go. I can hear them through the floor and come a’runnin’ when I’m needed, but I can write on my laptop in reasonable solitude. The best time is at night, when the house is quiet and the air filter and de-humidifier are humming away and the only noise is white noise and the occassional creaks of an old, old house.
Of course, the walls are an ugly shade of green and it’s rather cold down here. My “woman’s touch” has softened the place, but only by a smidge. I’d never have thought to write down here amongst the spiders and the unfinished basement-iness of the place (the office is the only room that’s finished, and it’s only half finished); but it’s not to place that I sit that I need, but the room for my mind to be my own–that makes it the best space in the house.
So you sometimes go to Paris ?
do you have heard about the “Chapiteaux turbulents”?
http://www.turbulences.eu/
In France there are not many thing done for autistics adults (I mean those who can’t easily find a job, whose autism is “visible” and who risk to be put in institutions), so i’t's important to notice this place where they can really create things and make spectacles.
I’m a swiss and french autistic and i live in Geneva.
I studied and lived in Europe. I lived near Strasbourg. Right now I have friends in Paris so it’s easy for me to go there. I’m hearing terrible stories of how the French view and treat autistics when I go there. I would like to learn more. Thank you for sending me the link as I will most definitely check it out.
the website where i go many times is named ASPERANSA
http://www.asperansa.org/
it’s a site (and a forum) where people are open minded…
i’ll try to tell more about this website, i don’t know exactly what to add now.