I’m a homebody — always have been, probably always will be. I feel most comfortable, most like myself, when I’m at home. It comes as no big surprise, then, that my best writing happens when I   am safely tucked away in the cozy cranny that is my house. 

Virginia Woolfe probably said it best: “A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction.” What she neglected to mention, however, is that a woman (or man for that matter, let’s not be sexist here) who writes fiction also needs time — and lots of it.

For people like me, who really love to write, finding the time to create fun plots and funny characters isn’t the problem. We write before, after, and sometimes during our day jobs, on the weekends, and even in the midst of a somewhat longer-than-usual trip to the bathroom. No, finding the time to write is not the problem at all. It’s finding the time to do anything besides writing that is the crux of concern.

Take for example, my own sweet “room of one’s own,” my lovely little apartment. It has served me well during my writing journey, offering me silent sanctuary and certain stability. I am fortunate enough, thanks to my position as a day job slave, to maintain the funds necessary to pay rent and to purchase all the little products and doo-dads (bleach spray, sponges, rubber plungers ect.) that are needed to keep the place ship-shape and Bristol fashion — except that I don’t.

And why? Because I’m a woman on a mission. I have a story, the first of many, to tell, to write. I don’t have time to clean. Virginia Woolfe would have been proud of me. That is, of course, assuming that she would not have been too busy being disgusted…

       Here in the Northern-most segment of the Northeast, the Spring Equinox has come and gone – and still we are buried in snow. We huddle in our houses, hunkered down in a period of extended-hibernation, waiting for the first sure sign of…something.

        In my day job, as an over-educated, well-paid slave, I convene with the other over-educated, well-paid slaves as we take care of our charges, watching them for the initial symptoms of…something.

     As I lose myself in the writing of my novel, however, I find that time slips by without my noticing it. Hour after hour passes too quickly, and instead of waiting/watching for something and finding nothing, I realize that I am actually doing something.

This doing is, I believe, the secret of happiness. When we, the fragile creatures known as human beings, dance too close to the precipice, that dividing line between waiting/watching and doing, we put ourselves in grave danger of falling off of it- of wasting our lives.

     
  An excess of watching and waiting can, if we’re not careful, be our undoing.

       A Blog. I, who have always been something of a luddite at heart, actually have a blog. It must be the future, but where are all the flying cars that “The Jetson’s” promised us?

       Seriously though, it was high time that I came out. I’m a writer, a Mad Scribbler actually, and, as you may have guessed, I like to write and scribble away madly. And so, because it is the future, I have now decided to spend a portion of my time scribbling away online. Offline, of course, I will still uphold my doppelgänger persona : the calm, cool, emotionally-neutral worker at a well-paying day job. One needs to do make these sacrifices in order to keep body and soul together – this one especially, as she loves eating. 

       And so, I must close the opening post of my blog. How sad, I was just beginning to get into this whole “living in the future” thing. But, don’t worry….I’ll be back (don’t say I didn’t warn you).