Finding the Time

As I am writing my third installment of the Season's Series, Fall's Descent, I was looking at the clock and setting time limits on how long I was going to keep writing, when I was going to clean the house, cook dinner, walk the dogs, weed the fish pond and spend time with the Hubster, family, and friends. It's much for one day and then I had to laugh. It made me think about a question I often get by people wondering how I have the time to write but as soon as they ask and before I can answer, they have their own. "Oh, you don't have kids." I just smile and agree. I don't have children. Life just worked out that way. It wasn't a plan, it wasn't a preference and I never rule anything out, but this is my life. Now, having said that, I do know that my mentor, Stephen King, had children and yet he still found time to write...fifty worldwide bestsellers to be exact, many of them before he could actually make a living off of them. But it was Mr. King's passion and he made the time...took the time to delve into the deep recesses of his imagination and spill them out on paper. In his book, Stephen King On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft, he talks about the challenges of finding the time to write but he set goals. He would shoot for ten pages a day which is almost 2,000 words. I shoot for either 1,000 words or one hour--whatever comes first. But, if the words are coming and coming fast, I don't shut if off when I reach my goal. I simply forge ahead. Stopping a good thought process is like finding that itch and not scratching. I scratch, scratch, scratch until it itches no more. There is also the flip side. I can sit for an hour and only write a paragraph which I later scrap. Let's face it. Just because I agonized for an hour over them doesn't make them worthy. Sometimes you have to kill the lovelies. And as tempting as it might be to leave the computer when the juice just isn't flowing, I make myself stay. It's a commitment. It's training, it's a promise I made to Mr. King, to myself. But there is a promise I made to my everyday life in being a good wife and mother to my four family members that just happen to have four legs and long luxurious tails. If this means that I have to write at 4:30 in the morning before work and at 11:30 at night so that I can walk the dogs with the Hubster, then so be it. That is what I do for the craft. So, to answer the question about time, perhaps instead of asking how do I have the time, the better question is, how do I make the time? My answer: I just do.