It’s summer! Officially time for vacations of many variety: family reunions, sunny days at cottages, long weekends, camping adventures, dinners on a patio with friends, and there’s no time to write! Or is there…?
Maybe it’s the best time. One the great characteristics of June is that it provides extra long days. Sunrise today is at 5:40 am and sunset at 9:10 pm. That’s 10 and 1/2 hours of daylight. If you travel further north, you get even longer days. I love this month. Put those extra daylights hours to good use.
Waking up early at sunrise and writing for a hour (even on vacation) is a great way to get in some quiet writing time. Everyone else is asleep (foolish them – you can sleep in winter which is meant for hibernation). And you might get to witness a beautiful sunrise for your efforts. This is my favourite time to write. On my last vacation, I enjoyed the quiet mornings with a cup of coffee on the deck overlooking the sea and writing in those peaceful moments.
I recently travelled to the island of Exuma in the Bahamas for the first week of June. What did I discover? Airports are potentially great places to write. First, you do a lot of sitting around and waiting. Put that waiting to good use and pull out a notepad or computer. Second, I discovered that there are electrical plugs everywhere so you can re-charge your laptop easy. No cost to you. There’s often free wi-fi in airports too, in case you need to do some last minute research. Third, there’s characters all around you! Hanging out in an airport, waiting for your connecting flight, is a good place to people watch. There’s family dynamics, friends, co-workers, the single traveller. I like to try to guess at their backstories, why they are travelling and then I make up what dark secret they have. It’s a good game to play at the airport. As a bonus, if you actually talk to stranger sitting next to you or waiting behind you in line, you often find a fascinating story too.
I have often found travelling to a new location helps inspire my writing. There’s something magical about being a new place that helps you look at your own writing in a different light. Vacation might be the perfect time to re-read your draft and make notes for changes.
I hope that whatever vacation plans you have, you share them with friends and family and make some small time to write too.
Happy Summer.
