May 07, 2001
I once heard a quote from a famous writer that said, “The best writing comes when you’re doing dishes.” I quite agree.
I have this morning routine that I do starting at 8:30AM or thereabouts. (My inner alarm clock isn’t always so precise) Once I get up, I start to boil the eggs in the water, I do my morning yoga, I then reduce the heat on the eggs and let them cook as I tidy up the flat just a little. Then I make my tea, defrost my frozen fruit, cook two strips of turkey bacon, cool down my eggs, and then proceed to write my morning pages. Just random bits of useless information of what I’m thinking, what I need to do, or how the world looks at just that moment.
This is all I know for sure each day. The rest is a surprise, including when, and if I write.
My morning pages has been the only kind of writing I’ve been able to force out lately. If I sit down to write an article my mind becomes blank. I can’t thing of one interesting thing to write about. This has been rather embarrassing to admit, after all, I am a writer. I should be pumping out novels each day!
Today when I woke up I wasn’t sure if I’d do any real writing. I started in on my morning routine of cooking the bacon and my mind started whirling of different article ideas to write . Not now, I thought, please brain just wait a little! I’m in the middle of making breakfast and you’ll just have to wait until I’m finished!
But my brain didn’t listen and the thoughts kept coming. Instead of grabbing a pen right away I hesitated. If I sit down now to type it, will breakfast survive? What about the tidying? What about…? Then I stopped myself. My purpose in life isn’t to sit around making the worlds best tea (although, that is a gift I do posses) or making sure that the dishwasher is loaded perfectly. My purpose is to write. And that should come second to none.
So I sat down and started to type away, clicking the keys so fast it almost made music. And I didn’t even mind that my tea was just a little too strong this morning.