What would be your ideal place to write? I think about this a lot.
It frequently involves me living in the 1920s, maybe in Paris as Hemingway and Fitzgerald did. I’d roll out of the rumpled bed in my flat, and head out for a baguette washed down with cup after cup of cafe au lait. I’d scribble away with a pencil, filling one notebook after another, pausing only to people watch.
Afterwards, I would head back to get ready to meet with my other expatriate colleagues, stopping for fresh flowers and a handful of fresh fruit from a vendor.
Or maybe I would be in New York City, slaving away at my typewriter before spending the evening trading quips with Dorothy Parker at the Algonquin round table, often ending the evening in a speakeasy.
Sometimes my visions are more contemporary. I’ll picture a den with a desk and lots of windows. The floor to ceiling shelves are filled with my favorite books, and there is a comfy chair in a well-lit corner. A small table sits beside it for my tea and a warm throw is nearby.
Or maybe I am in a beachfront condo, typing on a laptop as I look out on the white sand and blue water, the curtains blowing in the ocean breeze, the tile floor cold under my feet.
What all these idyllic locales have in common is that I am really productive in all of them and they don’t exist.
That’s my problem. I think I’d get more done with the right pen in a notebook or on on my iPad in a coffee shop or at home on my computer.
I’d be able to write better late at night or if I set the alarm earlier in the morning.
I should work on one of my blogs, or books or plays.
But frequently I find, when I turn in for the evening, that I have squandered yet another writing day.
I do that, too, think I’d write more/better if I just had this or that “perfect” tool, and spend more time chasing the perfect set up than actually getting down to the business of writing. For me, it’s a product of fear of inadequacy.
Me too, to both of you. The idea of being a writer in some far off place is so romantic though…perhaps in another life. 🙂
I used to think that a lot…and when I don’t write for awhile I start to think it again. I have two places I go. My favorite bar, where I don’t feel awkward sitting by myself. And my car. Surprisingly, my car is one of the easiest places to write. Drive out to a parking lot somewhere random and sit there and type on my lappy!