‘Charlie, I’m just going out will you do the washing up?’
‘Charlie, will you bake me a lemon tart?’
‘Charlie, will you go on comparethemarket.com and find me car insurance?’
‘Charlie, will you go on 4xtrahands.com and find me a job?’
‘Charlie, will you babysit my dog, I have an appointment at the hospital?’
They are just a few of the requests I get most days. Now, I understand that I’m sat in the house a lot, but I am doing something. Writing. And although it mightn’t be important to anyone else, it is important to me. It’s not like my family don’t know this – they know I’m writing a novel, joke about it often enough that it’s hard not to be enthusiastic about writing, yet they still come to me whilst I’m typing and ask me to do these things.
Okay, so when I babysit my Nan’s dog, I’m able to write – Chapter Three was written whilst she went for her appointment – but when I’m being constantly bombarded, my output becomes increasingly stunted. I’ve only written 170 words in three hours, because I’ve been doing this and that for folk.
I love my family, but it would be nice if they’d respect that I am serious about my writing. I do intend to send my novel off to agents and to polish the words until it practically shines off the page. I can’t do this, however, when I’m being asked to find someone cheaper car insurance! We have wireless internet, for Pete’s sake, it’s not like I’m hogging anything. You chose a Playstation over a laptop, it’s not my fault.
All right, so perhaps my rant is a little bit one sided. If you look at my family, and the fact that six people live here, it can get a bit overstuffed with pots and plates, and when we get post, the postwoman can be stood there for nearly five minutes. When I’m in the house all day, it can be annoying to find that only one sinkful of washing up has taken place, yet I’ve managed to write a chapter for a book that no one properly knows about.
If you met me you’d call me a slob. My days consist of writing and drinking copious amounts of tea. When I’m writing I can miss meals altogether (which you couldn’t tell if you saw the size of me), and turn into this evil person who bites your head off at every interruption. Here, I must apologise to my mother, who was only telling me someone’s email address.
I want to know whether anyone else has a family like mine, who can accept you’re a writer, but don’t actually understand the writing process. ‘You wrote 50,000 in two days, this is a rewrite, it shouldn’t take that long.’
We all know by now that writing 50,000 in two days makes you ill, you repeat things over and over, you don’t actually sleep properly, you drink too much caffeine even though caffeine makes you more ill, and then you spend days trying to force a migraine from your head. Don’t do it. Take your time. Enjoy yourself.
So please, someone tell me they have a family like mine.
I know it looks like I’m doing nothing, but I’m writing, constructing a world, creating characters, pacing things, plotting and making my antagonists antagonising, all you do is farm. (Yeah, two can play at this game. Well six.)
Until next time, that is all.
PS: The lemon tart turned out great. In The French Kitchen by Joanne Harris and Fran Werde – it’s amazing.
