It’s raining outside and when I lean back in my office chair something about the tilt of it or the room makes it swivel around to face the double windows. I watch the cars drive by my house and splash the small puddles of water as they go. A conga-like drum beat emanates from the eves trough and rushes out the end of the drain just on the other side of the wall. It is a glorious day to work…on writing. Many people have this belief that writing is not work. While I do enjoy it and that certainly makes it far more entertaining than any other work to me, it is still taxing. Writing makes me tired and feel spent when completed for the day. That sounds like work. Back in high school I remember having a heated debate with my physics teacher when he asked the question, “If you hold a dumbbell above your head, are you doing any work?” Naturally I took the position that the person was in fact working and he was set to prove me wrong. In the scientific community according to Answers.com, work is defined as, “work-applying a force to an object and the object moving in the direction the force is applied.” Since the object was not moving, from a scientific perspective no work was being done. I think a lot of people look at writing in the same way. A writer does not leave the house or commute to a job. There is no office or factory and the workday is not set in stone. Paydays are irregular at best. When someone asks you what you did today or whenever and your answer is, “I wrote” they look at you as though you took the day off or did nothing when you, in fact, accomplished quite a bit. The dumbbell may not have moved but you are still awfully spent. Webster’s has a broader view of work. They define work as, “Activity in which one exerts strength or faculties to do or perform something: a : sustained physical or mental effort to overcome obstacles and achieve an objective or result b : the labor, task, or duty that is one's accustomed means of livelihood c : a specific task, duty, function, or assignment often being a part or phase of some larger activity.” In this example writing is given its due. It is not a phenomenon isolated to writers. Other artists feel the same disrespect. It is different, though, with writers. Most of the time people can’t look at what you’ve produced in a single day and measure your labor. Instead, all they have to go on is your word that you worked very hard on a long project of which they can see no tangible results. It makes you see how our livelihood is so disrespected from an effort point of view. We live in a society where people act like you must EARN the right to be tired. To do so you must be able to show proof of your work. That is not always so easy for a writer. I think that’s part of the reason so few people make it as writers. You have to be strong enough to be able to say to yourself, “Hey, I worked my tail off on this today even though I only accomplished x amount. I know I worked hard and that is enough for me.” Now I think I’ll watch the rain again.
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