I’ll make this brief; it’s cold outside and my dog wants to
fertilize the lawn.
Aren’t we all the protagonists of
our own lives?
Of course we are, sillies.
And to us writers that makes time
our constant mortal antagonist striving to bring us down at every opportunity.
Time is life’s most valuable
commodity.
We trade ours in exchange for inked
paper the government calls money, and we exchange our precious monies for food
or we don’t eat and thus we die.
But there exists only 24 hours in a
single day, and though I could bore you with figures derived from the American
Time Use Survey from the Bureau of Labor statistics, instead we’ll split those
24 hours up to average out 8 hours of sleeping, 8 hours of working, and 8 hours
of leisure.
Not an exact split, of course and
depending on the particular person involved, but math is a sucker anyhow.
So we’ll accept that the average
American adult sleeps 8 hours per day and works 8 hours per day, which in turn
leaves them 8 hours of leisure to waste away by eating and pooping, showering
and shaving, surfing the internet for hot beastie porn, watching television and
pirating movies, beating the kids before and after school, washing clothes and scrubbing
dishes, mowing the fence and painting the yard . . . yaddah yaddah yaddah.
The stone cold fact is most writers
have second jobs because we can’t all be Stephen King and wishes don’t pay the
utility bills.
There goes 8 hours out the window
right there--whoosh!
Then along comes sleep stealing
another 8 hours--whoosh!
And Jack says, “All work and no
play makes Jack a dull boy” so we’ll heed his advice and split the remaining 8
in half, leaving 4 hours per day for writing while the other 4 we use to play
for sanity’s sake.
4 hours.
I’m an unmarried hermit with no
children, but I’m also as unique as I am handsome. So for your sake we’ll split
the remaining 4 hours in half again because some of you prefer having a thing
called Life.
Which leaves 2 hours per day for
writing that next great best-seller.
2 hours doesn’t sound like much to
some, and it sounds like a lot to others.
The average person types 40 words
per minute.
That equates to 2,400 words per
hour.
Which makes 4,800 words in 2 hours.
But let’s not kid ourselves because
no writer sits for 2 hours straight constantly typing.
We pause in musing ponder while our
creative juices stir and rouse. We stalk better descriptive words while
restructuring our sentences. We hunt the perfect words of dialogue while
sounding them aloud.
So we’ll cut that average of 40
words per minute down to a measly 8.
Well, technically, 8.3 repeating,
but let’s not split hairs just yet.
Even a braindead monkey with
Alzheimer’s and arthritis can type 8 measly words per minute.
Doesn’t sound like much after
paring it down, now does it?
Of course, 8 words per minute
equates to 480 words per hour, though now we’ll split those hairs by throwing
in that .3 repeating to make it an even 500 words per hour. And that makes
1,000 words accomplished in 2 hours’ time.
Ten years ago I set myself a daily
minimum word count goal of 1,000 words. No ifs, ands, or buts about it. Most
times I fly right by that daily minimum of 1,000 words without even breaking a
sweat because writer’s block is only a prancing unicorn myth to devious
plotters. Heck, there’s some days I’ll churn out 5,000 or 10,000 or even on
rarest occasions when my muse is firing on all caffeinated cylinders 15,000+
words before I’m done. Not all those words are keepers, mind, but that’s not
the point. 1,000 words per day is my minimum goal. If I can write at least
1,000 words before stopping then I feel I haven’t wasted my time and can
believe one day I just might even amount to something.
And so should you.
Because a goal without a plan is
just a wish.
And you know what they say about
wishes: “Wish in one hand and shit in the other and see which one fills up
faster.”
Without getting technical by genre,
the average adult novel word count is 90,000 words.
If you take 2 hours and write 1,000
words per day, 7 days per week, no excuses and no holidays off (not even
Festivus), you’ll have that 90,000 words accomplished in 90 obvious days. Three
months ain’t so bad to have written a novel, though you’ll obviously need some
time to polish that turd of a first draft for potential publishing so we’ll
tack on another 3 months for rewriting and editing--which is all the easier now
that those words actually exist.
3 months for a finished first
draft.
6 months for a finished novel.
I’ve never understood ‘those’
writers (you know who you are) who spend a whole year or even multiple years
writing just one novel. I mean, you’re a writer! What the hell are you doing
all day if you’re not writing? Heck, at the risk of sounding braggadocious
(which I’m about to be, and thank you very much) I’ve written 4 novels over the
past 2 years, all of them over 200,000 words, and am currently 100,000 knuckles
deep in a fifth.
Because I write at least 1,000
words per day, no exceptions.
So let me repeat: a goal without a
plan is just a wish.
And also add: failing to plan is
planning to fail.
Quit shitting in your hand while
hoping the other fills up faster and promise yourself 1,000 words a day
everyday.
Because time is life’s most
valuable commodity.
Value yours and stop wishing it
away.
What, you think writing 1,000 words
a day is too rough a task?
Then find another pursuit in life.
Or scroll up.
Because this sentence ends at
exactly 1,000 words.
. . .
Now, let’s finish this (and the
2019 year) with a bit of random trivia fun because even though astrology is
total bullshit it really irks the piss out of me that everything said of Virgos
actually applies to me. As to writing:
-Writes nonstop but doesn’t share
it with anyone: Scorpio, Capricorn, and Leo.
-Writes like five chapters then
gives up: Aries, Gemini, and Aquarius.
-Writes likes nine books in ten
days: Taurus, Virgo, and Sagittarius.
-In a constant state of writer’s
block: Cancer, Libra, and Pisces.
Famous writers, musicians, and
serial killers by zodiac sign:
CAPRICORN (December 22 to January
19)
writer: J. R. R. Tolkien (January
3, 1892)
musician: Elvis Presley (January 8,
1935)
serial killer: Niels Hogel - 100
known victims (December 30, 1976)
AQUARIUS (January 20 to February
18)
writer: Ayn Rand (February 2, 1905)
musician: Henry Rollins (February
13, 1961)
serial killer: Luis Garavito - 147
known victims (January 25, 1957)
PISCES (February 19 to March 20)
writer: Dr. Seuss (March 2, 1904)
musician: Kurt Cobain (February 20,
1967)
serial killer: Mikhail Popkov - 78
known victims (March 7, 1964)
ARIES (March 21 to April 19)
writer: Maya Angelou (April 4,
1928)
musician: Diana Ross (March 26,
1944)
serial killer: Alexander Pichushkin
- 49 known victims (April 9, 1974)
TAURUS (April 20 to May 20)
writer: William Shakespeare (April 26, 1564 )
musician: Willie Nelson (April 29,
1933)
serial killer: Earle Leonard Nelson
- 22 known victims (May 12, 1897)
GEMINI (May 21 to June 20)
writer: Anne Frank (June 12, 1929)
musician: Paul McCartney (June 18,
1942)
serial killer: Pedro Rodrigues
Filho - 71 known victims (June 17, 1954)
CANCER (June 21 to July 22)
writer: Ernest Hemingway (July 21,
1899)
musician: George Michael (June 25,
1963)
serial killer: Donato Bilancia - 17
known victims (July 10, 1951)
LEO (July 23 to August 22)
writer: H. P. Lovecraft (August 20,
1890)
musician: Mick Jagger (July 26,
1943)
serial killer: Elizabeth Bathory -
80 known victims (August 7, 1560 )
VIRGO (August 23 to September 22)
writer: Stephen King (September 21,
1947)
musician: Freddie Mercury
(September 5, 1946)
serial killer: Serhiy Tkach - 37
known victims (September 15, 1952)
LIBRA (September 23 to October 22)
writer: Oscar Wilde (October 16,
1864)
musician: John Lennon (October 9,
1940)
serial killer: Pedro Lopez - 110
known victims (October 4, 19480
SCORPIO (October 23 to November 21)
writer: Kurt Vonnegut (November 11,
1922)
musician: Neil Young (November 12,
1945)
serial killer: Moses Sithole - 38
known victims (November 17, 1964)
SAGITTARIUS (November 22 to
December 21)
writer: Jane Austen (December 16, 1775 )
musician: Jimi Hendrix (November
27, 1942)
serial killer: Ted Bundy - 30 known
victims (November 24, 1946)
And on that note . . . happy trails and happy writing!