WOW: where you write

Here’s this week’s prompt from Write On Wednesday: Last week we talked about why we come to the page, now I want to know where you come to the page. What’s magical about your writing spot (or spots!) Free write about the places you put pen to paper. Post pictures if you can - that would be even more fun!

My current writing space is usually the loft attached to my bedroom and overlooking the family room. I usually have to put my earbuds in and listen to music though, because Jagman will be watching tv in the room below and it is distracting. My loft is a rich, deep royal blue with white built-in bookshelves filled to the max. I also put up dry erase boards that currently contain character notes for my second novel. I’m still searching for the artwork to hang on the wall opposite my desk, the one I stare at all the time. I did finally enlarge six of my photos and hang them on the wall of the cathedral ceiling so I can see them from my desk.

I do have a couple “rooms of my own” to write in and have decorated them with gorgeous colors, woodwork and art that I like, but I still do my morning pages mostly in my pilates workout room in the basement. It’s a small room, painted a dark mustard color, and I leave the lights turned on really low, because I’m on my back for most of the workout and I don’t want to stare at overhead lights. Then when I finish my workout, I write in my journal for three pages, there in the dark room sitting on the pilates bench. It is more therapeutic if I play meditation music, but I usually have the tv on in the background. I’ve read that people light candles and even create a type of alter in the space where they write their morning pages, but I never got that far. I really like writing in the dark room first thing in the morning. Then, when I am finished, I head upstairs to the shower and get ready to face my hectic day with a feeling of accomplishment.

I used to do a lot of writing with the laptop in bed, but Jagman complained about the tapping of keys while he was trying to sleep.

When I wrote my first NaNoWriMo novel, I did most of it at home on the sofa in the basement, away from the rest of the family. That room is decorated with about 500 books on built-in bookshelves, too. It’s dark green with mahogany walls and shelving and leather furniture. When I first started blogging, I worked from an extra bedroom that I painted red and lined with bookshelves of dark cherry wood. The walls have white french memo boards filled with photos and notes, and a favorite horse print, large, with a picture light on it. My desk is a door that I stained and mounted on 4 x 4’s. I loved this room because I could shut the door and not hear anything, but my two boys wound up hooking their computers up in there and it was no longer a “room of MY own.”

My favorite and most productive writing space was the classroom I taught in, even though it was the least pleasing aesthetically. When I co-taught with a fellow writer, we would stay after school and write together on our NaNoWriMo novels. We’d both have our headphones on, laptops back to back across desks, minds lost in completely different worlds. At the end of our allotted time, we’d talk about ideas, music we’re listening to, blocks to or bursts of creativity, word counts. I loved having a writing partner. I haven’t had that opportunity since, and it’s one of the reasons I’ve tried sitting in coffee shops.

The coffee shop scene can be weird, I think. Sometimes I’ve been very productive and focused. Other times I am self-conscious and worried that the person sitting behind me can read my screen or the notes on the paper on the table.

I’ve always wished I could get over that and be able to write anywhere and everywhere… to pull a notebook out and write while I’m killing time somewhere, for example, or in front of other people (who aren’t writers). I know a lot of ideas have disappeared because I wait to get to my writing space instead of pulling out paper wherever I am.