I had been out of town and returned to find an email from a faithful reader of my blog. “Did you get food poisoning from your recipe article or are you just getting lazy?” it read. It addressed a dilemma I have regularly.
I try to write every day, but frequent travels require that I a) write ahead; b) simply disappear for those days that I’m out of town; c) announce that I’m going so that readers will know what to expect; or d) bring my laptop along and write wherever I am. Each of these solutions has benefits and disadvantages; and, in different instances, I’ve tried them all.
I imagine other writers with a reading public have the same problem. If they are like me, they want to maintain contact with their readership; as having someone outside your immediate circle of family and friends wait with interest to read the words you’ve toiled over is very gratifying. Not that family and friends’ opinions don’t count, but anonymous admirers count for more. Their interest in a particular writer is part of the reason to continue writing. Their interest offers hope that a person sitting somewhere alone with whatever means he or she uses to preserve thoughts on paper, even virtual Internet paper, will someday be well-known.
So while I try to write this column every day — and this is my 495th one — I’m prone to skipping every now and then. It’s not food poisoning or laziness or lack of inspiration. It’s lack of time, quiet time in which to think. All I can say to that reader who inquired is that I will always return to the written word like a duck returns to water. I couldn’t just stop writing, even if I wanted to.
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