Work in the Wrong Place
I learned something interesting about my work habits when I was visiting my dad and stepmom for Thanksgiving last week. We stayed in their big basement guest room, which is set up like a bed-sitter with a little living room area on one side and a nice bedroom area on the other, with a big table in between as a room divider. Lord, I love that table. I got more work done there in the half-hour before Thanksgiving dinner than I usually do in a whole weekend.
Which leads me to the interesting thing I learned: The workspace in my actual home is set up in the most perversely wrong way possible for the purpose of getting anything done. The desk is a computer workstation with no writing surface, and it's set so close to my easy chair that the difference between relaxing and working is standing up, aiming my butt in the other direction and sitting down again. The chair is a dining chair with no cushion. I have a lap desk to use in my easy chair, but my easy chair is so associated with not working in my mind that when I use it I proceed at about ten words an hour.
I used to think it was because I was lazy, but I work so much faster and more efficiently at my dad's house or the library or even my day job that I'm forced against my will to believe in the power of ergonomics. The thing is, I wasn't writing professionally when I set up my home office. The computer was for web surfing. The easy chair was for snacking. Finis. Five years into my freelance career, I'm still wondering why it's so excruciating for me to produce output when I ostensibly enjoy what I do.
So when I've met my two upcoming deadlines, I'll be cracking the old knuckles and shoving around some furniture in there until I've got a workspace that's conducive to, well, work. Something with a nice big surface for my books and notebook, with the computer over to the side, and the whole thing several feet away from my relaxing space.
Of course, this experiment was only performed on my freelance nonfiction. We'll see if it does anything for the novel. It certainly can't hurt.
Word Count: 32,116 (+0) -- yeah, you heard me.
Which leads me to the interesting thing I learned: The workspace in my actual home is set up in the most perversely wrong way possible for the purpose of getting anything done. The desk is a computer workstation with no writing surface, and it's set so close to my easy chair that the difference between relaxing and working is standing up, aiming my butt in the other direction and sitting down again. The chair is a dining chair with no cushion. I have a lap desk to use in my easy chair, but my easy chair is so associated with not working in my mind that when I use it I proceed at about ten words an hour.
I used to think it was because I was lazy, but I work so much faster and more efficiently at my dad's house or the library or even my day job that I'm forced against my will to believe in the power of ergonomics. The thing is, I wasn't writing professionally when I set up my home office. The computer was for web surfing. The easy chair was for snacking. Finis. Five years into my freelance career, I'm still wondering why it's so excruciating for me to produce output when I ostensibly enjoy what I do.
So when I've met my two upcoming deadlines, I'll be cracking the old knuckles and shoving around some furniture in there until I've got a workspace that's conducive to, well, work. Something with a nice big surface for my books and notebook, with the computer over to the side, and the whole thing several feet away from my relaxing space.
Of course, this experiment was only performed on my freelance nonfiction. We'll see if it does anything for the novel. It certainly can't hurt.
Word Count: 32,116 (+0) -- yeah, you heard me.
posted by kathy monahan at 12:32 PM
1 Comments:
I am so with you on this! I had to write a 100-page curriculum on "The Two Gentlemen of Verona" this fall. I could *not* work on it at my office -- too much distraction from phone calls, emails, co-worker chit-chat, etc. So I took it home and tried to work in my teensy desk space with no room to spread out notepads, etc. Finally, I took my lap-top to the enormous dining room table, cleared off everything else, and spread out my research notes, Complete Works, laptop, etc. It was phenomenal -- I was insanely productive.
Hope you are staying sane during the holidays!
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