The long-weekend writing hangover

On any given day, I’ve got a bazillion tasks and responsibilities that keep me from my WIP. I work full-time, freelance in my spare hours, maintain a household (with a little help from my husband, AKA the Chef), cater to three cats, respond to calls from my mother, deal with the guilt of not responding to calls from my mother, succumb to my current Mad Men addiction, and try to have some kind of social life.

This usually means my vacations and holidays are reserved for quality time with my home-office computer. Sure, I’ll have been jotting down crisp lines of dialogue over my lunch breaks or emailing myself with notes from my BlackBerry during the week, but I still need those long spaces of several hours at a time to get it all down and organized so I can move on to the next line, scene, or chapter.

With only a few breaks during these last four days—dinner with a friend, a massage, Easter festivities, and two naps—I managed to write an insane amount. I don’t track word counts (how do I handle edits and re-writes?), but I do track BIC (“bum in chair”) hours. This weekend’s tally? An astonishing 20 hours.

So, on this Tuesday after the extra-long Easter weekend, I am suffering from a writing hangover. That means stiff fingers, a sore back, paper cuts, photosensitivity, coffee jitters, and an intense aversion to clothing that does not double as sleep-wear. And possibly a real hangover, thanks to the Viognier that got me through the last three hours on Monday evening.

You know what? To me, it’s all worth it.

These weekend blitzes are what work for me and my writing goals. You may have different strategies for balancing the creative side of your life with everything else. As long as it works for you—and as long as it’s worth it for you—that’s all that matters.

I wish you all the best in your writing this week.

Maria

PS: Seriously, does anyone have an Advil? Now I know how Lindsay Lohan feels.