Queen of Procrastination
“I hate writing, I love having written.” ― Dorothy Parker
I love this Dorothy Parker quote because it encapsulates exactly how I feel about writing. Of course, Dorothy Parker was a genius, and even she has trouble getting her ass in the chair. There is nothing better than looking at a stack of manuscript pages or picking up something that you wrote years ago and marveling that it doesn’t stink. But sitting down in front of a blank page on my computer and watching the cursor blink as I struggle to come up with something, anything, interesting, not so much. Taika Waititi once posted on the app formerly known as Twitter that opening Final Draft (the screenplay software) and staring at an empty page for hours until he closes the software counts as writing and I agree with him.
Don’t get me wrong, I love editing and rewriting. There is nothing better than wrangling a gnarly chapter and turning it into something decent or editing a novel that is too long into something manageable, but sitting down and actually writing that first page can be tough. When writing is going well, there is no better feeling in the world, but on the days when I can barely crank out a paragraph, it’s like having root canal with out anesthetic. There is nothing more painful than struggling to find the words that are somewhere in the resources of your mind but aren’t quite making it through your fingers on to the page.
I used to joke that I wished that I had that pensieve thing (I think that’s what it’s called. Dumbledore used it once) from Harry Potter where I could just draw the words out of my brain and magically have them appear on the page exactly the way that I’m thinking them. Instead of writing, I’m finding ways to procrastinate. If procrastination was an Olympic sport, I would have multiple gold medals like Michael Phelps or Simone Biles.
When I wrote Scandalous Women, I spent the last two months before it was due to my editor, writing in a frenzy from 9 pm to 3 in the morning, and then sleeping until 10 am (I was unemployed at the time). It’s not a beauty regimen that I recommend. Most of the book was done but I’d indulged myself a little bit too much in the research process. Instead of just reading two biographies for each woman, I sometimes read six or more.
Here are just a few ways that I procrastinate on any given day:
Taking my laundry to the laundromat.
Watching the previous day’s episode of General Hospital and tweeting about it.
Reading various gossip blogs like Celebitchy and LaineyGossip.
Going down the rabbit hole reading about conspiracy theories about the Princess of Wales.
Picking up my holds from my local NYPL branch (why do they all seem to come in at once?).
Actually doing my day job.
Reading old issues of the International Herald Tribune (this research for the WIP which is set in Paris during WW2).
Thinking up ideas for Christmas romantic comedies (this actually counts as writing, just writing in my head).
Checking Facebook, Instagram, and X.
Checking my email.
Entering Publisher’s Clearing House Sweepstakes ($5,000 a week for life is nothing to be sneezed at. Even after taxes, it’s still $100K a year).
Downloading samples of books from Amazon that I may want to read to my Kindle.
Taking photos of dresses that I hope to sell on eBay.
Writing my weekly Substack post (Okay, this is actually writing but it’s not my current WIP, so it’s still procrastination).
Putting items in my Fresh Direct basket and then taking them out again.
Checking prices for flights to London for my September trip.
Entering the lottery for tickets to Sweeney Todd and Merrily We Roll Along (I’ve already seen Merrily once, but I would love to see it again).
The only thing I don’t do is clean my apartment. I draw the line there! Eventually, after I’ve exhausted all my excuses, I then get down to writing. Opening up the document with the latest chapter that I’m working on helps as well. It’s just staring at me, daring me to ignore it. I wish I was one of those writers who can sit down in a chair at 5 am or who treat their writing like a 9 to 5 job. Having an actual deadline whether it’s for the writing course I’m taking, NaNoWriMo or because I’m submitting to a contest helps.
I think one of the reasons that I procrastinate is because I’m both a perfectionist and I have fear of failure. Over the years, I’ve gotten the perfectionist thing under control for the most part. But the fear of my writing not being good enough never leaves me. I’m working on this as well. I’ve tried bribing myself over the years, or self-imposed deadlines never seem to work. What has started to work is writing for 15 minutes and then letting myself to something else for 15 minutes. Also, I’ve started writing daily pages which are just three pages of whatever I might be thinking about at the moment, not necessarily related to writing. It’s more like a journal but it gets the juices flowing. And starting this Substack has definitely helped! I still find myself procrastinating but it’s not as bad as it used to be.
What I’m Reading:
Sex and Vanity by Kevin Kwan: I loved the Crazy, Rich Asians trilogy so I was eager to pick this up of my TBR pile. Unfortunately it wasn’t quite as satisfying for me. While attending a lavish wedding on the island of Capri, Lucie Tang Churchill meets George Zao and she instantly can't stand him. The daughter of an American-born Chinese mother and a blue-blooded father, Lucie has always sublimated the Asian side of herself in favor of the white side, and she denies having feelings for George. Five years later, Lucie is engaged to the very rich and snobby Cecil Pike. But when George shows up in East Hampton where Lucie and her family spend their summers, she finds herself drawn to him again. I could see that there were echoes of classic novels such as Persuasion and A Room with a View in the novel but the novel took a long time to get going for me. I’m looking forward though to his next novel Lies and Weddings which comes out in May.
What I’m watching:
Quiet on the Set - The Dark Side of Kids TV: It’s a horrifying and disturbing look at what went on at Nickelodeon in the nineties and early aughts. The documentary asks questions as to how this type of behavior was allowed to run rampant and what can be done in the future to make sure that the kids who are working are safe from predators and abusers. The first episode focuses on producer/writer Dan Schneider and his absolutely unprofessional, misogynistic, and inappropriate behavior towards staff as well as to the kids working on his shows. I highly recommend it. It’s streaming on Discovery+ and Max.
What I’m looking forward to:
Mary & George on Starz: A historical miniseries about Mary Villiers, the Countess of Buckingham and her son George, the first Duke of Buckingham. It stars Julianne Moore and Nicholas Galitzine (one of the IT boys of the moment). In the miniseries Mary molds her son to seduce King James I and become his all-powerful lover through intrigue, making her family richer, more titled, and more influential than England had ever seen. I already know going in that this miniseries is not going to be the most historically accurate but I don’t care, it looks sexy and fun, and the costumes look amazing. A lot of shenanigans were going on during the reign of James I, and I’m happy to see a historical drama that is not set during the Tudor era or an adaptation of a Philippa Gregory novel.