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Every writer likes to talk about writing, the way golfers want to talk about golfing and parents want to talk about kids, and travellers talk about where they\u2019ve been. I\u2019ve been asked by some e-mailers and bloggers to talk about writing and what I do.<\/p>\n
First, my vocation is one of teaching, scholarship and writing, and that puts me in a position and in a history of sitting at a desk with a pen and paper, or a typewriter, or a computer. And I\u2019ve been doing this as a professor since 1983, and if you count the student days, since 1972. I\u2019m either working on lectures or articles or books all the time. Very few get to do what I do, and I\u2019m grateful for the vocation.<\/p>\n
Second, I love what I do. I don\u2019t get up in the morning and say to myself, \u201cAnother day of writing when I\u2019d rather be doing something else,\u201d or \u201cAnother day of teaching and I wish I could be making more money working on Wall Street.\u201d I go to bed thinking about what I\u2019ll do tomorrow.<\/p>\n
Third, what this means is that I get up, have breakfast, say my prayers, and go to my basement and start writing \u2014 and this is usually by 7am. Not always, but most of the time. I\u2019m a friend with, not a slave to, my computer.<\/p>\n
Fourth, this summer, for instance, I\u2019ve been working on a commentary on James \u2014 and I would work on it on most days (almost never on weekends; that is family time and what time is open, and there is often plenty, I read). The edits came through on Embracing Grace<\/span>, and that meant plenty of time was spent working on that ms too. And I got some galleys back from some projects, so I spent lots of time on that, too.<\/p>\nMy daily schedule, for the summer \u2014 and it will all change when we begin school next week, was usually from 7am to 3pm or sometimes 4pm at the computer. I drink tea often, and I let Webster outside to do his business, and I answer the phone, and I make a light lunch, and I wear down by 3 or 4pm. I then head upstairs, make the salads for dinner, and cook the dinner. I love to cook, and Kris needs some down time when she gets back from the office. We then eat and take a walk around Butler Lake in Libertyville, and read and watch the news, and blog and read blogs, and chat the evening away.<\/p>\n
Fifth, blogging for me is fun \u2014 it is to me what TV is for others. I think about it as conversation with people of all sorts, and I think about things that can be said that might be useful to others, and about what can get some conversation started, and I\u2019m not afraid to stick my neck out with ideas I\u2019m thinking about and am not sure about. Some bloggers want to fight about things, and want to show the world they are smart in their comments, but I find it to be a conversation.<\/p>\n
Sixth, on what<\/span> to write about. I don\u2019t know how ideas come to me, let\u2019s just call it the Muse Clio. (An old Greek idea.) For academic things and for writing projects, I keep a small little piece of paper in front of me that I pin to the shelf. It is a list of what I\u2019ve agreed to write, and I just work my way down the list. For instance, next on my agenda are these things: a book on prayer called Praying with the Church<\/span>, write papers for conferences on Jimmy Dunn\u2019s Jesus Remembered<\/span> and John Miller\u2019s Jesus at Thirty<\/span>, and write a small article for Covenant Companion<\/span> on Flannery O\u2019Connor. (James will sit here until next May, when I can pick it up in full force, and its completion awaits my sabbatical in a couple of years.) If I agree to book reviews, I put them on another list and read them in my evening time or commuting time. I rarely miss deadlines, but sometimes I do and I don\u2019t like it when I do. Sometimes I agree to write things that become uninteresting to me before I get to them. But when I have an idea, I jot it down and think about it, and I get a folder out and toss things into it just in case I may need them.<\/p>\nWell, maybe this will help. If you\u2019ve got other questions about my writing, let me know.<\/p>\n
Tomorrow I\u2019ll blog on some advice on how to be a better writer.<\/p>\n
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