… about it being your only source of income, is that you know you can work all the time. And when things are tight, you feel like you should work all the time … that if you can just get more words on the page faster, that the money problems will get better, that you won’t feel like you’re drowning.
But that perception is a lie, because nothing you do is going to make the money come in faster than it’s going to come in. Publishers pay when they pay, and it rarely has anything to do with when you need to BE paid. And if you’re beating the keyboard to death, running in circles, pinging off the walls, you’re missing your life, which is everything you do when you’re writing, but also everything you do when you aren’t.
Tight deadlines and all, I took a bunch of time today to site at the kitchen table with my kids and glue sequins onto styrofoam balls to make Christmas ornaments for our tree. So I’m getting started late, and I may not make my word quota tonight. But we had fun, and I didn’t miss my life. And the money will still get here when it gets here. Or else it won’t.
