Writing in the Margins of Life

I am pleased to have Sarah Pekkanen with a guest post today.  I recently reviewed and loved her new book, Skipping a Beat.  (My review in case you missed it…

http://www.greatthoughts.com/2011/03/503/.html/

 Sarah’s book is getting huge buzz- it got a great review in the new People magazine- this one is going to be big.

 I’m so glad to have her here today.   Enjoy!

Writing in the Margins of Life By Sarah Pekkanen

Here’s what I used to imagine writing my novel would be like: I’d stroll into a charming little coffee shop, order a vanilla latte, and open my laptop. The words would gracefully unfurl from my fingertips while I nodded in delight at my own cleverness. I’d complete a chapter, take the last, frothy sip of my overpriced beverage, and head home, content and tired, but eager to return the next day and craft another gorgeous chapter. 

 Huh.

Here’s what my journey to writing a novel was like: I was dragged into Chuck E.Cheese’s by my kids, my laptop wedged under my armpit. I scanned my surroundings, searching for a centrally-located table with maximum surveillance opportunities. I ordered a glass of wine (oh, yes! My local Chuck E. Cheese’s serves wine!) and piled a small mountain of tokens on the table.

“One token at a time,” I instructed my kids. I typed a few words, glanced up as a kid rushed back for a token, and resumed writing. I was interrupted every thirty seconds, but soon I settled into a rhythm: type a bit, get a visual on the kids, type a bit more.

In subsequent months, I wrote more of my book in the dentist’s waiting room while my kids got their teeth cleaned, and in the carpool line for school (don’t worry, my car was in Park.) When my agent called to announce she was sending my novel out on submission, I picked up my battered laptop and took the kids to see Kung Fu Panda and frantically re-read my manuscript, searching for typos, while mainlining M&Ms (er, perhaps that last bit wasn’t really relevant. Plus, it’s now making me crave M&Ms. Excuse me just a moment).

But here’s the crazy thing: I actually prefer writing on the fly to the inherent expectations of the coffee house culture. I think it’s because we writers are so good at messing with our own minds. We type a sentence, mock and ridicule ourselves because it’s so lame, then begin to wonder if we’ll ever write a decent sentence again. We decide we probably won’t, so we wander off in search of a snack. Then we beat ourselves up both for breaking our low-carb diets and for not having the discipline to sit down long enough to hit our target word count for the day. It’s emotionally exhausting.

Writing at places like Chuck E. Cheese’s somehow makes the process less precious. All the pressure is off, because who in their right mind would try to craft a novel while a giant mouse dances a few feet away and crazed, glassy-eyed children careen around, screaming in either joy or terror (all screams sound alike at Chuck E. Cheese’s)? Somehow, the writing comes more easily there. And I don’t mind the noise, because I used to work in crowded newsrooms and am used to the screams of editors (which, for the record, were not usually screams of joy).

Writing works best for me when it fits in around the margins of my life. Now that I’m on my third book, I’m better able to handle longer writing stretches, and I’ve even ventured out to coffee shops at times. I’ve found I also adore writing first thing in the morning, during those quiet, golden hours when everyone in my house is asleep.

But I still return to the way I first learned to write a book, in little snatches and pockets of time. Just the other day, I scheduled an admissions test for my son to attend a new school.

“It’ll take about an hour,” the school official told me. “Do you mind waiting?”

I thought about my laptop, and the deadline for my next book, and I smiled as I said, “I don’t mind waiting at all.”

You can learn more about Sarah at her website, www.sarahpekkanen.com or on her Facebook page,  https://www.facebook.com/pages/Sarah-Pekkanen/215202723761?ref=mf.

What are you reading and where are you going?