Writing Is Like Painting Your House by Brenda Leyland

photo: pixabay.com

The writing process is much like painting a room in your house.

Imagine it’s a warm Spring morning. You throw open the windows and suddenly feel inspired to spruce up the bathroom with a fresh coat of paint. You rush out to Home Hardware for paint and rollers, then whip home to take down window coverings, and clear the counter tops and towel racks. A glance at the clock, gasp, reminds you the morning is slipping away. There’s still green painter tape to put around the tub, shower edges, and 'squeeze past the toilet' to tape whatever's back there that you don't want paint on. A quick search for the screwdriver, and light switch plates and baseboards are off. Finally, you think you're ready, except the myriad nail holes in the wall blink at you – they all need filling and sanding. Feeling the pressure of time on your neck, rather than searching for the tube of filler, you quickly pass a bar of soap over those tiny holes and hope for the best.

Your energy level for this 'quick' paint job has disappeared with the day. It’s late afternoon, and you haven't painted a single brushstroke. Earlier you felt rushed; now you're feeling irritated, too. That room would be all fresh and sparkling with its fresh coat of paint if there weren't so many preparations to do first. What started out as a one day job was now spilling into two.

* * *

Well, that certainly is a perfect picture of my writing life. When I start a new project, I long to get on with the actual writing of the piece. Invariably, there are other tasks I first need to do in preparation: developing an outline; doing the research; locating suitable quotations; considering my who, what, when, and why; filling in the nail holes of fuzzy thinking with a clearly thought out theme statement. And, I mustn't forget about the primer either. That dull but necessary underpinning coat--aka the first draft in a writer's world--upon which every forthcoming brush or keystroke will depend as layers of colour, richness, and depth are added.

One day, some years ago now, it finally clicked for me that the prep work makes the actual task of writing, or painting, flow smoother and with fewer mistakes. I shouldn't rush through the planning stage to get to what I consider the good stuff. It's not a waste of time. It turns out the time-consuming task of taping edges in the bathroom definitely ensures fewer paint slips to clean up later. And, doing a little homework before starting that first draft will prevent me from painting myself into a corner later.

I also came to realize that the preparation often takes as long as the actual writing of the essay or painting of the room. It's that way for most jobs -- when a person sews a jacket, plants a rosebush, makes a fruitcake, and, yes, even writes a simple post like this one. The prep takes time. Abraham Lincoln certainly recognized the principle when he said, 'Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four hours sharpening the axe'.

Recognizing these intruding front-end tasks are an integral part of the whole project, I quit being annoyed when they seemed to be stealing my writing time. They are not. Sharpening the axe is part of chopping down the tree. Taping the fixtures and edges is part of painting the room. Gathering the documentation and hammering out an outline is part of writing the book. This preamble work has become a more pleasurable part of the process for me since I now make room for it in my schedule and no longer have to hurry or squeeze it in. I am more patient because I know the time will come when I can paint word pictures to my heart's content, dotting my i’s and crossing my t’s, and then finally typing ‘The End’ in a flourish of bold, clean strokes.

I'm so grateful for the valuable writing lesson I learned while painting my bathroom one fine Spring mor--, afterno--, weekend.

Brenda writes from her home in Sherwood Park, Alberta. When she's not writing, she might be gardening or painting another room in her home. She blogs at It's A Beautiful Life.