A day in the life of a writer

Let's face it, writers are just people, even if they do disappear into an imaginary world so many hours a day. They are not ordinary people, but they still have to do ordinary things. Well, at least they do if they are female! Male writers, in general, can get their heads down and plod on with the hopeful best-seller without interruption. Female writers, unless they are earning mega-bucks, pounds or euros, still have to stop to make the coffee and the meals, do the washing and the ironing and the cleaning, go shopping, walk the dog, see to the children and talk to the next door neighbour because there's nothing worth watching on the tele and the woman is bored.

Out of all the above the only thing I don't have are children. I used to cry over that lack in my life, but now I'm too old to get emotional about it, though I do still harbour the odd regret, especially around Christmas time.

All writers have their own way of working, the way it works for them. I'm not at all consistent these days, although I used to write from ten in the morning till almost midnight for a few years until the fuses blew and my body told me that I'd overdone it. Never again, though even now, once the words are flowing I can keep going for hours on end, with short breaks for sustenance an a caffeine fix with "Murder She Wrote". When I grow up I want to be Jessica Fletcher!

Today, however, has not been a normal day in my life. It started with the usual chaos at around eight o'clock when my two dogs, Candy and Toby, had their little war of the canines between telling me it was time they had their breakfast. That was followed by me trying to sort them out, have my own breakfast and tidy up the house, which should have been done yesterday, but I got sidetracked by my painting of an African elephant! This morning we were expecting a visit from a local insurance man to look at our insurances and see if he could offer us lower premiums than we were already paying. I spent two and a half hours with him and my husband, who doesn't speak French, translating, explaining, searching for papers up and downstairs. Toby the 7 month old puppy tried to eat up the insurance man's documents, then ran off with one of my documents and I threw a cup of coffee over myself. Giles, the insurance man, thought it was all very entertaining. He must think we English are completely mad.

We grabbed a quick sandwich for a late lunch and I was just settling down to work when a couple of strangers knocked on the door asking for details of my art class for the wife and French lessons for the husband.

I've managed to take young Toby for a short walk to get rid of a bit of manic energy and it's now 4.45 pm - and do you know, I couldn't write a word if you paid me! I'd go and put a few brush strokes on my elephant painting, but it's gone all stormy outside and the light is too poor to work in my "atelier", which is our old camping car converted into a mini-studio. I think I'll just have a stiff drink, put my feet up, do a bit of therapeutic knitting and watch one of my "Friends" DVDs. Tomorrow is a new day, no?