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How do I write, when I have a day job? is a question most writers ask. The answer to that question is: Write at work.
So how do you do you do that? Elementary--arrange your work around your writing time or change your job.
Your Job Environment. Ideally you should be computer proficient. Today one has to be computer proficient to find a job. If, by some oversight, you are not, if you write in long-hand, if you work in a place where everybody writes in longhand, you can follow my rules. If such an antediluvian working environment does exist, I suggest that you bring the place into the pre-21st Century, so that you as the computer person will rule the roost and you can compute while all the fuddy-duddies pencil on. But you’ll have to get an assistant, or all the real work will come your way--not a good idea.
Ideally you need a closed office, so avoid an open plan office, á la 9 to 5, or Working Girl. You don’t want any delinquent sneaking up on you behind your back and spilling the beans. You want a place where someone else answers the telephone, where your job is typing. Typing anything--letters, articles, reports... Then, as you bang away at your novel, everyone will think, "There’s a good worker--putting the rest of us to shame."
In the old days, when you played Space Invaders on the computer there was a What to do when the boss appears button that put a stupid page of figures on screen. Today we have Windows 95. Windows 95 was invented so you could work and moonlight at the same time. It’s called multitasking. You have office work in progress in one window, What Happened at the Office Party on another window. When the office supervisor comes past, you hit the task bar. Give your novel a temporary task-bar name like To whom it may concern The supervisor may have eagle-eyes. Be sure you don’t send out 150 copies of three chapters of What Happened at the Office Party instead of To whom it may concern to the company clients, unless they happen to be publishers.
Overtime. It may be that you cannot do all your writing and all your work in the allotted 40 hours a week. So come in an hour ahead of the rest of the office and work late. If you have to punch in, good. If you have to get paid overtime, good. Bosses like workers who work overtime. If you get the Academy Award for best act in the office, good. If you get a promotion and help in the office, good. You’ll be able to farm out all your work and concentrate on your novel.
Office noise. The work environment can be very noisy. You may need earplugs. Better still, get a dictation machine. When you have the earphones on, you’ll hear less outside distractions. You may even have something on the machine, like work, or better still your thoughts or chapters dictated at your leisure. When you are listening and typing, other staff members will leave you alone. You will look like a very efficient worker. You can dictate into your recorder on the train, going to work, having sex. This will greatly improve your writing efficiency.
Your computer. Make sure other staff members and, heaven forbid, the boss cannot access your writing files. Your co-worker may be a wannabe writer who will plagiarize your work. Some idiot may erase the lot. If the boss is computer illiterate, and most bosses are, be careful. He may have children. If he brings them into the office and they get to your desk, you may never see your files again. If they erase the company files, that’s bad, but if you haven’t got that novel backed up, well--killing the boss’s seven year-old may make you popular with his neighbors, but not with a jury. You and I know a writer has the right to kill anyone erasing his work of art, but until a precedent is set, pleading justifiable homicide in such a case is a little risky.
Your lover. To avoid questions at home, get yourself a lover. Then your spouse will think you are with your lover, your lover will think you are with your spouse, but you’ll be at work, writing your novel.
Your Boss. You have a conscience? You feel bad about taking advantage of your boss. Don’t feel bad. Having known such a famous writer will be sufficient reward. There is no need to mention your place of work or your boss in your acknowledgments.
The story DON’T GIVE UP YOUR DAY JOB is Copyright 1998 by Joe Gilad.
The collection of works called Fish Eggs For The Soul is Copyright
1998 by Brian Rickman.
Copy edited by Sara Fawbush,
editor of The Young Writer's Collection.