Just getting back to normal at the moment after five days without power.
For those that missed it in the news, Queensland has taken quite a battering over the last week or so with heavy storms and wild weather. We live in quite an elevated position, so thankfully we were not flooded like many other people in Queensland. The city of Bundaberg, just north of Brisbane, was particularly hard hit.
Our suburb was subject to some pretty severe weather – including some pretty extreme wind gusts. One thing I really like about the area is the large blocks and the pleasant greenery. Unfortunately the trees in combination with the wind gusts led to hundreds of fallen power lines. In the region there were more than two thousand fallen lines and 300,000 households without power. Some people in our suburb are still waiting after six days.
The lack of electricity and the muddy water entering the main Southside treatment plant led to problems with mains water, with low levels in local reservoirs, but thankfully we did not lose water supply, although one adjacent suburb did.
After that many days without electricity I realised how much I had come to rely on electronic devices for distraction and entertainment! Cooking was fine. I had a good amount of camping equipment and thankfully some good books.
Now, getting back into writing involved finding a local council library that still had power (and air conditioning! The humidity after the rains stopped was pretty awesome).
The interesting thing about working in the local council library was how good it was. I found I really managed to focus on the work, despite the babbling toddlers and other punters all flocking there to check their email and take advantage of the free wi-fi. I had forgotten how well I usually work in new environments, like hotel rooms and cafes. I can switch off from the noise, so that’s not an issue.
I think what makes these environments so good for me is that they are ‘psychic blank slates’. My usual home and writing environment seems to come ‘pre-loaded’ with a whole set of feelings and thoughts that more often than not act as a barrier to getting work done and tuning into the world.
I did a motivational seminar once were the presenter said something along the lines of: ‘Each day we have around 27,000 thoughts. The only problem is that 97% of them are the same ones we had yesterday!’
I’m not sure about the numbers, but I know that getting into a completely new environment really works for me, screening out some of these ‘pre-loaded’ thoughts. Something that I had forgotten.
Do you work well in new environments?
Cross-posted at chrismcmahons blog.
Mad Genius Club 
10 responses to “Thought and Environment”
There may be something to this. I wrote 2,500 words in 2.5 hours one day when I had no place to be for a few hours except a nice restaurant followed by Starbucks. I seldom hit that word rate at home.
I also wrote most of another story in airports while traveling. In that case it was both isolating and also inspirational, since the story was set entirely in an airport.
Airports are great for that. I used to do a lot of travelling for my day-job. Writing on the laptop was a way to convert annoying, boring hours of samey waiting areas and cramped 737 seats into a bonus of extra writing time. It usually took a bit of a push to get started but the upside was definately worth it.
It just goes to show how every writer is different, and circumstances alter cases.
I have ME/CFS. I get only a few hours of usable writing energy per day – IF I carefully follow my rituals: block the Internet (ahem – I was just going!), take the pills, open the (now) Scrivener file, start forcing the brain to re-load everything we lost since yesterday, write/revise, notice clock says Naptime!, swear, take nap, repeat once, done for day. Take extra nap. It’s very much like working an electronic device with a battery which won’t hold a charge AND can’t be used while charging.
ANY change to the routine, and we gets nothing for the day. Fight the system (I’m a grownup – I hate taking so many naps), and we gets nothing. Play sudoku – there goes the day. Possibly, if I’m desperate and had to leave the house, a few random notes in my current notebook, notes which very rarely get turned later into usable stuff, but at least helps me keep the writing part of my brain thinking, and I hear writing by hand is also good for the brain.
I’m not complaining – it is what it is. And IF I follow that routine, the words and the pages add up, and those glorious two-hour chunks when I’m living in a different place feel SO good. Writing maintains whatever sanity I have.
But my reality is different from yours – I’m always glad to read about others’ lives so I can enjoy them vicariously.
Better go – I have stuff to do, and commenting is too much fun.
It’s great to see that despite your challenges you have a routine that works for you. CFS is definately no picknick. My neice battled it for a number of years and managed to build up her stamina again, so hopefully you have that to look forward to.
Writing does give you that break from the every day. I really miss it when I have to break my writing flow.
I can do non-fiction in new environments, but not fiction. Perhaps because I am a creature of routine, and all archives have a similar scent (booky), sound (hum of climate control, murmur of low voices, quiet typing or pencil scritching), and temperature (ice cold to the point that during the noon-ish break even I end up basking in the sun like a lizard ). Then spend the evening in a hotel room (all similar when you’re on my budget) organizing my notes and sleeping. The lack of laptop also crimps my fiction writing. I’m that strange researcher at the rear table who still takes notes by hand.
I must admit to being torn. I love pen and paper, and still love to write in my personal journal with good old ink. I also love paper notes, but I have given in to practicality and mostly go electronic these days. Mostly because it’s so much easier to find things in the document, and I can put everything for one area of research into the same file. At least I know it won’t get lost!
At work it’s much the same. I got sick of changing jobs and carting around archive boxes. So with technical documents it’s taking notes from pdf directly to word files. Next time it’s going to be a handful of texbooks and a few USBs!
I’m the opposite – it is much easier for me to find material on note pages than in a computer file. I can be typing along, glance over, find the reference and quote that I need, and be back in the flow of writing faster than I can flip documents from the WIP to a note document. Plus I process and recall the information better if I have to write it by hand. *shrugs* Call me very old school. 🙂
I can get a lot of writing done away from home _if_ it’s a part of something I have already started. I do a fair bit of waiting about for car repairs and so forth. I live so far out in the boonies that’s it’s easier to wait for hours than try to find rides to and from dropping the vehicle off.
But I usually set things up, so I have a set piece to write. “Okay. Today I will write the fight scene.” Or the next chapter, or . . . I don’t seem to come up with new ideas while away, or maybe I just haven’t tried.
Making use of ‘dead time’ always feels like a bonus. It really sounds like you have the planning and strategy down pat, Pam:)
Glad the hear you were high and dry, or at least not flooded, and I hope everything is getting back to normal for your neighbors. It’s not fun when Mother Nature takes us down a peg or two.