Writing Notes

LH: You work a 9-5, which is something I find completely foreign. (I’m a totally bourgie—or I was at least—academic.) What do you do, and how do you think your writing fits in? KR: Okay, I’m going to answer your question, I promise, but the whole writer-in-the-academy versus writer-not-in-the-academy dichotomy makes me feel all soap-boxy. I’ve been a professor of creative writing and I’ve been a 9-to-5-er, and I’m not singling anyone out, but many academics have the tendency to make an inordinately big fat deal about how “busy” they are, usually stated in semesterly terms, like “It’s the start of the semester, so things are really busy,” or “It’s almost time for spring break so things are crazy,” or “The semester’s almost over so I’ve got a ton of grading on my plate,” etc. Which no doubt is all true; work often crescendos in overwhelming cycles. (LH: I’ll add a side-note in here too! Most academics I know whine like crazy! Esp. the ones who have the lightest teaching loads! I’m just saying… I agree!) But other employed people, people with jobs outside academe, seem not to make such a production about it, maybe because it’s understood that everyone is pretty busy all the time and it’s not anything exceptional, but rather just the condition of people who have to exchange their labor to earn money in order to have the services and products they require? Also, all this demonstrative “busyness” strikes me as protesting-too-much; having been a professor, you’re busy, yeah, but usually you’re not as constrained as when you work a typical 40-plus-hour week that demands that you be physically present and constantly available/alert in a particular place with specific projects and co-workers. Also? When you are a 9-to-5-er? You don’t get “spring break.” Anyway. I work in as a Senate Aide to the senior Senator from Illinois, and it is probably the best work environment I have ever experienced. The work feels meaningful, interesting, value-expressive, and cooperative, and keeps me from getting caught in the self-regarding echo chamber that I sometimes felt closing in on me when I taught (though I loved teaching and hope to return to it someday). In any event, I don’t want to go on and on about being a Senate Aide (partly since some of my best stories about it are already in For You, For You I Am Trilling These Songs), but one more thing I have to add is that I am incredibly lucky to have sympathetic superiors who understand that people can be committed wholeheartedly to their jobs while also wanting to cultivate outside interests. One quick example: about this time last year, I was about to embark on a 25-city book tour behind Live Nude Girl with the lovely and talented Kyle Minor (Hey, Kyle! I bet you’re reading this! Wave if you’re reading this.). Lots of employers in these tough economic times might have answered my request for a two-month non-medical, non-maternity leave of absence with, “Sure, you can go but don’t come back because we can’t hold your spot,” but they not only let me, they were super-encouraging. Anyway x2, having looked at this question from, as Joni Mitchell would say, both sides now, I think it’s challenging to be a writer in tandem with earning a living no matter what you do. But it also seems that whatever job you’ve got can potentially be fodder—or at least provide such resources as access to a laser printer, etc.—for your writing, and that if you have adequate time management skillz (which, by the way Lily, you clearly do since you’ve had like, 12 books accepted for publication between your sending me this question and my sending you this answer) (LH: Ha! Ha! You’re not so different!), you can probably get some stuff written, even if it’s during those intervals in the cubicle when you’re between assignments and trying to “look busy.” What do you think you’ll do next, job-wise?