To plan: to devise or project the realization or achievement of. – Merriam-Webster
Once upon a time, I had a grand plan. We will call this Plan One. I was going to write, and I did. I wrote a piece here, a piece there - published almost anything I submitted. My kids were very little at the time so it was “okay” if I was spotty with my commitment. As time went on I adjusted to Plan Two and became involved in the medical field again in an effort to “do something responsible with my time” and earn a paycheck. The writing took a back seat but it was “okay.” There would be time later. I had a plan.
Now, if you aren't a writer you may not grasp the desperation that comes with this affliction. Writing, for me is an addiction. I can merrily roll along for only so long until I fall off the wagon. Again. To be honest I violently launched myself out the window of the moving wagon of Plan Two, terror across my face at the prospect of a lifetime of responsible and sensible gainful employment. There was also the matter of Later, a word I believe should be written with four letters and followed with a thorough mouth washing. You see, I woke up one day, took two asprin for the headache that always comes from too much cabernet, looked into the mirror and realized today was later. I wasn’t twenty-four anymore or even thirty-four. Later was now. I needed a new plan.
I attended a writer’s retreat to jumpstart Plan Three. I was going to write a novel. It was a momentous time for me. I had a story and I was going to write it. Plan Three was it baby. I came home with visions of book covers dancing in my head. That evening my husband informed us we were moving 3000 miles away. I left Plan Three in the dumpster as we pulled out of our New Hampshire home headed for Texas. It was ok. We were headed on an adventure. Every writer needed adventure.
Now, if you aren't a writer you may not grasp the desperation that comes with this affliction. Writing, for me is an addiction. I can merrily roll along for only so long until I fall off the wagon. Again. To be honest I violently launched myself out the window of the moving wagon of Plan Two, terror across my face at the prospect of a lifetime of responsible and sensible gainful employment. There was also the matter of Later, a word I believe should be written with four letters and followed with a thorough mouth washing. You see, I woke up one day, took two asprin for the headache that always comes from too much cabernet, looked into the mirror and realized today was later. I wasn’t twenty-four anymore or even thirty-four. Later was now. I needed a new plan.
I attended a writer’s retreat to jumpstart Plan Three. I was going to write a novel. It was a momentous time for me. I had a story and I was going to write it. Plan Three was it baby. I came home with visions of book covers dancing in my head. That evening my husband informed us we were moving 3000 miles away. I left Plan Three in the dumpster as we pulled out of our New Hampshire home headed for Texas. It was ok. We were headed on an adventure. Every writer needed adventure.
Plan Four took shape a few years into our Texan experience. I fleshed out my ideas for not one but three consecutive books. I researched, read and wrote. After three months I had a very rough first draft. I told people I was writing a book to hold myself accountable. If people knew my plan I would have to produce or explain why Writer was up on the shelf with Actor, Doctor, Teacher, Midwife, Nurse and Artist. I had tried on a number of lives and discarded them to the back of my life’s closet one by one, tags still on, barely worn and very much unfinished. There are innumerable unfinished novels out there in the cold, hard world. Mine would not be among them.
I designed a dummy book and photographed it on a bookstore shelf between Hogan and Howell. Momentum built and it looked to all, including me, that Plan Four was the charm. Four months later we moved. Then my kids had lives of their own. Then the house needed attention. Flu season came. Summer vacation arrived and left. By the following Fall my brilliant Plan Four lay pitifully on the floor, next to discarded flip flops and dust bunnies, disintegrating in the pressure cooker of my life. Suddenly all the excuses I had been placating my ego with were no longer “ok.” My lack of progress was decidedly not ok.
So what now? I wondered. Maybe I am not cut out for this. Maybe I am not a real writer. An author once told me to be a writer you must write every day. Anything else means only that you write. I wanted to be a writer. I needed to be a writer. I needed a plan.
Abraham Maslow, psychologist, is quoted as saying “If you plan on being anything less than you are capable of being, you will probably be unhappy all of the days of your life.” I believe him. So, here’s my plan:
Plan Five: plan to be amazing. Plan Five: to be a writer, word by word, sentence by sentence. Plan five: to write, to bob and weave with the punches of everyday life and come back each day for more. Plan Five: to have no plan at all. In the immortal words of Steve Winwood: “Just roll with it baby.”
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