Writing in the Cracks

Writing In the Cracks: Finding Time to Write
By Sandra Miller
Originally published in Writer's Forum, a Writer's Digest publication

         "I just don’t have time to write anymore."  How many times have you heard that said?  How many times have you said it yourself?  All of us have obstacles that make it difficult to find time to write.  Sometimes they are reasons, sometimes they are excuses, and sometimes they are completely out of our control, but the good news is this: no matter how crowded your life is, there is always time to write.  In this article I will present you with the time-tested strategy I use myself.
         Write in the Cracks:  The most important piece of advice I can give you is to write in the “cracks”.  “I don’t have time to write” usually means, “I don’t have a big enough block of time to write”.  Imagine for a moment that you don’t need a big block of time to write--and now believe me when I tell you that it’s true!  This was one of my most common excuses for not writing, and I can’t describe the difference it made when I finally decided any amount of time was enough to write.  You can write anywhere, anytime.  At orchestra rehearsals I always carry my latest work in my violin case; then when our ten-minute breaks are called I can write a page or two while everyone else heads for the vending machines.  Take a moment now and think of all the “dead” time you might have in your schedule.  You can work your writing into most of that time, with a little thought.  For instance:
         Commuting: Carry a micro cassette recorder in your car.  You can dictate notes on your latest work--even entire passages, while you are sitting at red lights.
         Appointments:  It almost never happens that you go to an appointment for anything and are shown right in.  Appointments for meetings, doctors, dentists, are all opportunities to get a few more minutes (or more!) of writing time in.  A small spiral notebook or a few sheets of paper folded in half will fit perfectly in most purses, or you can carry a legal pad in an executive-style notebook and no one will think twice about it.  Waiting for appointments isn’t nearly so stressful when you can put the time to beneficial use.  This is doubly true if you are taking someone else to an appointment.
         Breaks:  I don’t know how many coffee/lunch breaks I let slip away before it occurred to me that I could be using that time to write!  Instead of just sitting and drinking a soda, I found that I could often get a page written, which gave me a wonderful feeling of accomplishment.  Slipping into another world during breaks was also a great tension-reliever.
         These are just a few general ideas.  Your own schedule and habits will probably reveal many more opportunities that are unique to you.  For instance, my husband loves to take the car to a car wash every weekend when we go shopping.  While he is outside cleaning the car with the oversized-toothbrush, I am inside the car with the baby, waiting and wasting time.  I finally realized that I could put that time to constructive use.  I’m prepared now and carry a notebook with me in my purse all the time, but at the time I didn’t have anything like that with me.  I found some old receipts in my wallet and wrote on the backs of those.  Don’t let anything stop you when you decide you’ve found an opportunity to write.  Use cocktail napkins if you must, but get the words out.
         You’ll find that writing in the cracks can also improve your productivity.  For many people, it takes pressure to get the words really flowing.  Writing in the cracks will do that--nothing gives you that productive pressure like knowing you only have five or ten minutes to write.  And when you do have time to work add you’ve written to your “real” manuscript, be it in a notebook or on a computer, you will have an excellent opportunity to edit.
         If you really want to write, chances are that you have the time in your schedule to do it; it’s simply broken up between other obligations.  When you start using these little slivers of time to work on your writing, writing in the cracks, you’ll be amazed at how quickly it adds up to a finished piece.