POV: Having a Day Job and Writing
Written by Jessica Carman Wade
My day job consists of owning my own property management company. However its more like a cross between Monty Python, This Old House, Jerry Springer, and Cops. I use my experiences and observations as a basis for my writing with a little influence from James Thurber. Putting a humorous light to the situations that occur makes it not only enjoyable to the reader, but also keeps my sanity intact.
The main obstacle that I have is how to organize each of these writings and put them into a screenplay format. I have been playing with the idea of doing a screenplay based on a 24 hour period on this particular street. However I find myself with the questions of: Do I have enough material? What do I include and what do I leave out? Where do I start?
My challenges are more application in nature. I see my day job and my life as a major influence and inspiration to every piece I write. As I frequently say, “I observe and report.”
I am a 31 year old, southern accented lady from Central Kentucky. I am also a mother of two boys, wife of a quick witted Australian, sister of two military brothers, the US Marine that is a mixture of Clint Eastwood and Jim Carey and the very quiet and complete opposite, US Airman. I am the daughter of a juvenile probation officer in an Amish county, and the daughter of a retired police officer, now real estate broker in a housing slump. I own a very small property management company, which manages very socially active properties. All of those pieces make up the puzzle that is Jessica Carman Wade.
My blogs, which are actually my writings, are located at myspace.com/jess102777
this was totally uninformative about having a day job and writing. it’s one of those topics that i’m very interested in as i have a day job and try to write but this post had no answers to it.
when do you actually write? morning, before work and your brain has really started? night, after work and your brain dead? lunch breaks? weekends?
i heard the guy who wrote virgin suicides wrote two hours every night after work. but how many people can write two hours after work?
Killer: What do you find difficult about having a day job as a writer other than the time limitations? Energy? Focus?
Have you read 10 Ways to Find Time to Write?It’s goes into a bit more detail I think you might find helpful.
Jessica’s challenge is to organize her writings from her blog into screenplay format, which was one of the first ways I wrote about regarding finding more time to write.
Christopher, thanks for the reference to 10 ways. I’ve gone with all of them at some point, though recently I’ve been going with breakfast, though more to freewrite and just gets word on a page than to work on a project.
It’s absolutely about the energy and focus which I relate to the time limits – it’s incredibly difficult to find energy or focus before work, when i’m preparing for the day, or after work, when i’m unwinding from it. i think my issues are the same as everyone else’s, i’m just wondering how others combat them. is it finding short amount of times multiple times a day or making a commitment for one longer time and mentally prepping for that throughout the day? is it jotting ideas and collecting them at night or starting the day with a blank page? what do you do on the weekends to augment what you do during the weekdays? i’m sure the answers are different for everyone but i’d be interested in everyone’s answers.
i didn’t understand that jessica was specifically focused on taking posts and turning them into script pages, but i can see what she means now. however there’s certainly a lot more room to work with if focusing on something more based on daily life than not – i don’t think there’s a reason to start a blog for a fictional work, but maybe there’s something to the idea of treating fictional work like a blog that just needs a little work a day.
I appreciate the feedback and the information.
To killertv, I write after work, usually late at night. I write about events that happened during the day. I thought I was attempting to help people use their jobs as a point of inspiration, instead of looking at it as a challenge. I do appologize that it was not the information you were looking for.
ChristopherR2D2:
Thanks. I am grateful for the opinion and explanation.
Every writer is different. That’s the idea behind the POV.
Thanks for the POV Jessica!
obviously i missed the purpose of the article and i shouldn’t have been a critic – excuse me.
thanks for sharing
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