The Roman author Catullus was writing about his unrequited love for the unrepentantly promiscuous Clodia when he penned the words I’ve lifted for this blog’s title, but I can relate to feeling hot and cold about the same subject.
I love to write; I hate to non-write. Yet, I need to have that “non-writing” state first, for it is my process of preparing to write.
Let me explain about this process I call “non-writing”. For me, the “non-writing” action is a vital step leading to the point where my creative juices are flowing and I’m busily immersed in writing my novel.
By “process”, I mean the mind-set I have get into before I can even bear to sit down, focus and get going.
The extent of this “process” is …
The same thing applies to non-fiction, for me, by the way. I would have to clean my room, sort my tea boxes alphabetically, and do the dishes before I could sit down and start rooting through the reference books for assignments back in those university days. So this has been going on with me for awhile!
This need for distraction from the job at hand may look like procrastination on the surface, (and yep, that’s probably what I would have called it myself back in the day) but it’s actually some sort of necessary mental prep work that seems to have to be in place before I can begin with the task of writing. I really need to have my writing environment in some kind of order before I can proceed with my work. Weird, huh?
But back to writing fiction, specifically the novel I’m working on
I’ll have a deadline looming, be staring into space, facing the depressing duo of blank screen, blank mind, when suddenly, dirt and disarray will set me off like a red flag in front of a bull’s face.
I have to jump up and start doing something – anything – that asserts order around me. It seems to be a clearing of the mental decks, as it were, so that my brain gets settled down and focused.
Floors are swept, furniture moved, the mirror that had been inoffensively lying on the floor for three months finally ends up on the wall. Surfaces are dusted, drawers sorted through, old papers fed to the shredder. And all the while I feel this calm feeling of readiness and being able to focus building up inside of me.
Then suddenly, I’m ready
The orgy of organizing stops. I’m able to sit down, open the laptop up, and start writing.
Once that metaphorical flag has dropped down, I race off. My fingers fly (ok, peck – but fast and furiously!) over the keyboard. Ideas form into words and sentences, and stream onto the screen – from wherever it is in the brain’s Superior temporal gyrus they come from.
There will be lots of time spent on editing and re-writing, don’t you doubt that for a minute, but at this point I just let the flow of plot and character development happen, and stay out of the way.
Because I love writing.
