Work bleed
I got an e-mail from someone on Monday, Labor Day, apologizing for bothering me on the holiday, then adding, “But you writers never really take a day off, right?” Righto, little one.
I know I’m not the only one having this experience: National holidays mean nothing. Weekends mean nothing. 5:00 means nothing. One day bleeds into another, day bleeds into night, and work bleeds all over the place. The only way I can actually convince myself to shut down my computer is if I’m going into the backcountry where there’s no internet service.
[For an excellent analysis of how we feel about e-mail, read Nora Ephron's piece in the NY Times, "The Six Stages of E-Mail." That says it all.]
I’ve tried instituting new rules for myself over the summer: computer goes off by 7:00; no blogging on Sundays; take two one-hour breaks during the day to read; etc., etc. So far I’m pretty hit and miss with those. I love it when I comply, because I actually sleep better, enjoy more books, enjoy my personal life a whole lot more.
So why can’t I do that all the time? I see what’s good for me, and still!
It’s been so interesting to watch over the last few months as a lot of our familiar bloggers declare themselves on blogvation (which I believe we’ve adopted as the official term for blog vacation? Yes?). Sometimes it lasts a week, sometimes longer (those people are rocks!), and all we readers seem to understand and support that.
But it seems that once Labor Day we all take a breath, pull on our big girl panties, and go back to business as usual. And I’m just wondering if that’s the best idea. Can’t we bring some of that laid-back summer mellowness to our work and blog lives? Shouldn’t we hang on to something like an Internet Sabbath or a Saturday Picnic Day or something that forces us to push back from our screens and go live some life at regular intervals?
Just wondering how you guys handle doing it all, all of the time. I’m especially in awe of those of you with day jobs AND kids AND writing and/or blogging lives.
How are we all finding the balance we so clearly need?
Technorati Tags: Blogging, Writing, Publishing, Life, Families, Simplification, Self-Care, Relaxation, Blog Vacation, Moderation, If Work Is Available 24 Hours a Day Do We Have To Take It?
September 5th, 2007 at 8:35 am
Sing it, sister.
I’m obsessed with something I don’t even like. The email, I mean. Not the blogs. Those I’m obsessed with and find pleasure in. Deadly double whammy.
And I mean, what’s the deal with spending whole evenings clearing in-boxes? As if. You KNOW that half of those folk are just gonna email you back again. I’ve started shutting down the computer when I go to get the kids from school, but it pains me something fierce. I swear. It’s worse than kicking caffeine ’cause ibuprofin doesn’t help. Here’s the deal. If I wake up at 4:30 a.m. and go to my computer I want it to be because I am so driven by and passionate about my NGI (new great idea) that the muse is my master. Right? The rest of the night, we oughta be sleeping. In the dark. No blue shine from a nearby screen…
September 5th, 2007 at 10:16 am
Liz, I know what you mean. I feel like I should install one of those kiddie locks on my computer, but for ME. And now that I have a laptop, it’s worse…I can work anywhere! Anytime!
Robin, I was wondering the same thing about laid-back blogging myself. As you know, I’m a newbie to this, but I’ve been posting almost every day, and I’m wondering if that’s too much. Not for me, necessarily, because I enjoy it, but would it be better for my readers if I left a post up for a day or two, so they could catch up at their leisure? I mean, I know they can read back posts anytime, but beyond a certain point, we all give up on the back log and read what’s current.
I can’t wait to hear your discussion of this, and other things, at the Blogging for Authors session in Chicago.
September 5th, 2007 at 10:49 am
Liz, WORD. In every possible way. Word, word, word.
Sara, I’ve had that same thought myself: would the world be better (or more realistically, would the world continue turning) if I blogged fewer times a week? I’m actually grateful that people like Meg Cabot only blog every four days or so. I love to sit down and read her long posts, but I don’t think I could handle it if she did it every day.
And I love reading your blog, and other people’s, but the truth is if you and they cut back to an every-other-day schedule, I might just be happy rather than disappointed.
Is this horrible to confess? It’s just that Liz is right about how reading other people’s great blogs and e-mails interferes with me working on my own NGI (Liz, love your various initials, like “FMS” for “‘fraid of missing something”). I obviously don’t have the discipline to stop reading my fellow bloggers’ posts, and even though I said I was going into the cave and wouldn’t post so much I seem to have gone back to my regular ways.
It’s hard to stop! We need a support group! Liz, you can name it.
September 5th, 2007 at 11:49 am
Well, I’m absolutely no help whatsoever. While reading this post, I’m sitting on the floor with my laptop beside me, glancing from the screen to the baby. She’s lying on her back looking up at me as I tickle her feet or dangle a toy, and probably longing for more eye contact to go with my absent-minded murmurings toward her. My oldest plays nearby, building massive foam block towers and begging me to help. “Just a minute,” I keep saying, knowing after I read this I’ll have an email to write or a diaper to change or a baby to nurse. Knowing I need to work on the five books I’m supposed to copyedit by October. Knowing I have a new post idea for my blog (one of those blogs where I write way too much but only post every few days). Knowing I should hurry and write the scene idea I’ve been developing for my novel. For one so adamant about limiting my kids’ screen time, I’m not so great at limiting my own! But I sure do enjoy the online conversations–my link to the outside world.
September 5th, 2007 at 12:08 pm
Oh, and don’t even get me started on keeping the house livable and dreaming up something appealing and healthy for dinner!
September 5th, 2007 at 12:40 pm
See, Kelley, that’s what I’m talking about–I always feel so strapped for time, and I don’t even have kids! You people are Wonder Women!
But I do know what you mean about these online conversations being a link to the outside world. I talk online more than I do on the phone.
September 5th, 2007 at 2:28 pm
Ah, Robin, you’ve hit on the essence of blog. To be a bigger blogger - ie, more links, more hits - you have to update every day or nearly every day. But the bigger your blog gets, the more time you feel you need to spend with it.
The other problem with not writing every or almost every day is that it becomes a slippery slope. It becomes easier to miss a few days here and there, and then a week, and then you lose some readers, and you blog less, and so on.
I think a key is knowing what your blogging goals are - to build readership, to exercise your writing, to stay in touch with the community, to reach out to your book readers - and act accordingly. If you want to be an online presence for your book readers, you don’t have to post every day. If you’re trying to get build a go-to blog, you do have to post frequently.
For me, I can do some of my blog reading at work, but not all. Writing is at home - which then conflicts with kids and homework and dinner and oh, life. But I love it anyway.
September 5th, 2007 at 2:35 pm
Wait, was “Because I love you people and I miss you when we’re not together!” one of my choices? Yeah, I guess that was “community.” I’m a sucker for that.
But Mother Reader, I get what you’re saying. And that’s something I’ll be interested in talking about with other bloggers–including authors who blog–at this conference.
September 5th, 2007 at 7:07 pm
Like Liz, it’s the e-mail that gets me down. You clear out a box, and by the next day there are 20 messages. Because of the blog, the cybils, the forest, writing and writing groups, and, oh yeah, my day job…I have 5 accounts going. And none of them are ever at 0. I’ve GOT to find a way to deal with that.
Blog reading, writing, and commenting I do in between everything else and it doesn’t bother me that much. The community has given me more than I have given in spades.
September 5th, 2007 at 8:17 pm
We’re supposed to have blogging goals, MR?? Oh, man. I’m such an underacheiver.
OK, folks, how about the fact that we come back to the COMMENTS of certain blog posts because they’re so compelling. I mean, we’re in deep here.
OK. Support group. Lemme start thinking.
Too Much Screen Time For Our Own Good???
(TMSTFOOG??) FOOG is good, but the rest of the acronym is, frankly, forgettable.
Online at Bedtime?
For Love or Email?
Google Get a Life?
I’ll get back to you on this…
September 5th, 2007 at 8:33 pm
Hey Robin! I totally understand only my problem is living too much and not writing enough! And i’m always second guessing myself on my writing, and thinking I need to prepare to write. Like Getting a drink, snack, music, so I’m kind of postponing the writing proccess. I don’t know what to do! Writing and life= really hard… Any ideas?
September 5th, 2007 at 9:17 pm
I think I seriously need to limit my computer time to when my daughter is in bed. So, I should get up early and write late. Hmmm. But then there’s exercise, guitar practice, storytelling practice, and oh yeah, parenting. All in all, I have a pretty laid back life except for when I get stressed. Still, I wouldn’t mind having an honest-to-goodness holiday like back in the days when I was single and Labor Day rolled around.
September 6th, 2007 at 12:13 pm
Kelly: “Blog reading, writing, and commenting I do in between everything else and it doesn’t bother me that much. The community has given me more than I have given in spades.” So true! Thank you for helping me put it in perspective.
I guess it’s still that messed up work ethic of mine that says if I enjoy something it can’t be considered valuable–it must just be play. But what’s wrong with play? Calling our resident psychologist Deborah . . .
Liz, I don’t care what it stands for: I am hereby adopting “FOOG” as the term for spending too much time online and not enough time noticing real life. As in “Man, I fooged all weekend. I have GOT to get out more.” Tell me that won’t throw people off.
Dylan, I am so with you on that! The “preparing to write” stage can take an awfully long time–going out for Starbucks, getting your office in order, answering all the e-mail so that’s caught up, maybe checking a few blogs to make sure you get that out of the way–and whoops, where’d those two hours of writing time go? It’s the eternal struggle, my friend. I wish you as much luck with it as I wish myself.
Alkelda, that bit about having a generally good and laid-back life except for when you get stressed–yep, which is why it feels so odd to complain about the stress part. But you know me, I try to figure things out as a group. My ultimate secret goal is for all of us to be deliriously happy and creative all the time. How sinister is that?
September 6th, 2007 at 1:38 pm
Thanks Robin glad to know it’s not just me! I think we just need to buckle down and do what we need to do. It’s so hard though…
September 6th, 2007 at 6:16 pm
Thanks for putting some of these things into words, Robin (and others). I struggle with this all the time. The email is especially tough. I spent an evening with a friend last week who I hardly ever see, because she lives 3000 miles away. And we each spent about 3 hours doing email (we had been together with other friends for the weekend, but still…). It’s just so impossible to keep up with.
I enjoy working on my blog, but I definitely put pressure on myself - to keep up with other people’s posts when I’m traveling, to keep up with reading and reviewing all of the books that come in, to reply to all of the comments, etc. I frequently have to remind myself that I’m choosing to do this, but I still pressure myself.
Still, I am very happy about the community, and having other blog posts and comments to read.