http:\/\/www.rachellegardner.com\/2012\/01\/writers-quirks\/<\/a><\/p>\nI write anywhere. Well, not in the shower, but in airports, on planes, in doctors’ waiting rooms (routine exams – I\u2019m not sick). Wherever I shlep my computer I write if I have at least fifteen minutes. At home, I write in my office or on my laptop, which lives in the kitchen when it isn\u2019t traveling with me. In the kitchen, it\u2019s on a counter. I could put it on the table, but I once read that it\u2019s not healthy for people to sit for long periods, so when I\u2019m downstairs, I write standing up. The laptop is called Reggie, named after the dog character in The Wish<\/i>, years before we got our puppy Reggie.<\/p>\n
In my office I sit, except when I get up to pace or to stare out the window. The view is lovely no matter the season: stone walls, ancient tall hemlock, antique outhouse (we do have indoor plumbing).<\/p>\n
Right now I\u2019m at a poetry retreat waiting for the day\u2019s session to start. I\u2019m in an austere place, a former orphanage on the grounds of a current convent. My room was once an orphan\u2019s bedroom, and it\u2019s small! There\u2019s no desk, only a bed, wooden chair (no cushion), metal gym locker, narrow bed, high dresser, no private bathroom, alas. I\u2019m standing on tiptoes to type on my laptop atop the dresser.<\/p>\n
I wonder what my father, who was an orphan and grew up in an orphanage, would think of me being here. Laugh? Roll over in his grave?<\/p>\n
The reason I work anywhere is because I trained myself to be able to many years ago after reading Becoming A Writer<\/i> (middle school and up, I’d guess; the language is old-fashioned but the ideas are modern) by Dorothea Brande. I travel a fair amount, and I don\u2019t want my work to grind to a halt whenever I leave home. People who can write only when the moon is full and the stars are in a certain alignment don\u2019t finish many books. In an airport, under a giant TV blasting endless headlines, weather, and commercials, I can work. I\u2019m irritated. I wish the thing would shut up, but I work.<\/p>\n
I don\u2019t write outdoors much. In winter it\u2019s too cold, obviously. In warm weather there are bugs and beauty. Beauty distracts me!<\/p>\n
My desk in my office is a disaster area. I swear when I finish the first draft of used-to-be-called Beloved Elodie<\/i>, I\u2019m going to clean it up. If I need a pen, I have to feel through the layers to find it. On the desk is a memento of my father, a gift from one of his friends. It looks like a hinged wooden box. On top there\u2019s writing that says, \u201cFor the man who has nothing, something to put it in.\u201d The joke is that when you open the box, it turns out to be just a block of wood. There\u2019s no cavity. My father loved the joke.<\/p>\n
This is a poem I wrote about my office, imagining it as part of a museum show of offices of kids\u2019 book writers:<\/p>\n
My office<\/p>\n
stands in for me, part of an exhibition
children wander through. Jason heads
for the wooden skull from Mexico.
Brianna goes, Ew!<\/i> and Yuck, don\u2019t touch that<\/i>.
Ella likes the hand-made Christmas-tree ornaments
around my windows: the quilted heart in muted pinks,
edged by brass beads; the striped parrot;
the black paisley angel. Sara picks up the small,
lead Tinker Bell on my desk. Everyone marvels
at my origami swan made from a Tokyo candy wrapper.
Ms. Kramer points out my English usage books.
Outside, somebody calls, Wow!
J.K. Rowling\u2019s office! <\/p>\n
They\u2019re gone. No one paid attention
to my quiescent computer, with a hundred e-mails
locked inside. The children didn\u2019t notice
the hand-hewn, 1790 oak beam or the 1920s
pewter lamp. They glanced past the photograph
of the rosebud with its red petals folding
in on themselves, its shadowy hole, the two
droplets of dew.<\/p>\n
When I\u2019m home I don\u2019t listen to music while I work; I prefer silence.<\/p>\n
If the writing isn\u2019t going well, I get sleepy, and I have to take frequent breaks, to stretch, answer an email, anything that will wake me up. I like to write while I eat breakfast and lunch and my nightly snack because I can\u2019t sleep and chew at the same time.<\/p>\n
I almost always write directly on the computer, but when I use a pen, it\u2019s a cheap gel pen on a steno pad. I don\u2019t like ballpoints because you have to press too hard, and I don\u2019t like Sharpies because the ink bleeds through to the other side of the paper.<\/p>\n
I don\u2019t have a big family, but my husband is delightfully proud of my books. When I\u2019m stuck and suffering, David, who is supremely sympathetic, suffers too.<\/p>\n
My sister and his sisters and my brothers-in-law like my work. His sister Amy directs a public library, and I went there to speak. Libraries run in David\u2019s blood; Amy and four cousins are or were librarians (one is retired).<\/p>\n
I\u2019m trying to think of a quirky quirk for you. You all know from the blog that I don\u2019t plan my books out ahead of time, that sometimes I wander around in a fog for a ridiculously long time. If I thought it would do any good, I would tie a shoe around my neck, touch Reggie\u2019s nose, stand on my head (if I could) for an hour to make the writing flow. How about this? When I\u2019m describing a facial expression, I\u2019ll do an Google images search for the emotion I want to show, but I\u2019ll also make faces at myself in the mirror.<\/p>\n
When I wrote the Disney fairy books I had to keep scale in mind because the fairies are only five inches tall. I had to ask myself, What\u2019s a five-inch creature in relation to a quart of milk, to a caterpillar, a potato, a cherry? To remind myself I kept a five-inch bottle of hair goop on my desk the whole time.<\/p>\n
Here are a few prompts:<\/p>\n
\u2219 One of the exercises we did at the poetry retreat was to write a list poem, which is basically a list. So write a list poem about your writing place. To make it work as a poem, the items should be detailed, can be fantastical. Surprises are nice, and it\u2019s good to end with an item that goes against expectation or packs an emotional wallop.<\/p>\n
\u2219 Sometime before next week\u2019s post, write outside your comfort zone. Write in the living room while the family is watching television. Bring your pad to breakfast and write while you chomp down on your pancakes or your high-fiber cereal. See if you can zone out of the distractions, see if the distractions themselves take you somewhere unexpected.<\/p>\n
\u2219 Again, before next week\u2019s post, write in an unaccustomed mode. If you usually write longhand first, go directly to a computer, or vice versa. See if there\u2019s a change in your writing. Does the new method open you up? (You can then return to your usual way, but sometimes it\u2019s good to shake things up.)<\/p>\n
\u2219 Write a chapter in your future memoir about yourself as a writer, whether or not writing will be your career. What got you started? Write about your real past, but also imagine the future. What has been a turning point or what will be? Describe your greatest past triumph and your greatest upcoming one.<\/p>\n
\u2219 If you like, post your own writing quirks here.<\/p>\n
Have fun, and save what you write!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
On April 28th, 2011, Squid, writer, wrote:1- Where do you write? Virginia Woolf famously said it’s important to have a room of one’s own… How do you arrange your supplies, do you write indoors or outdoors? I’d like to know.2- What supplies do you use? Do you write first drafts longhand, or do you type […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[145,146],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=136"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":414,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136\/revisions\/414"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=136"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=136"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=136"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}