Reading AND Writing by Christine Duncan

It’s been a busy pre-Christmas weekend. I went to the office Christmas party, babysat my favorite one year old on the planet, shopped for food and Christmas presents, cleaned, did laundry, ran a couple of times and baked cookies. Lots of cookies. Rolled sugar cookies. Peanut butter cookies. Christmas cookies. So tonight when I knew it was time to write this blog, my brain did the kind of negotiations usually reserved for a twelve year old who wants to stay up later than his bed time. I knew it was irrational, especially when I made the (in retrospect) snotty observation last week that I scheduled my writing and that I would write when it was on the schedule. But irrational or not, I didn’t want to write. I wanted to read.
I found myself browsing Bookbub and Amazon for a free e-book. Now, I’m not usually a big fan of free e-books. Writers should get paid too. I spent time knocking that one around in my brain. What was I doing? I not only wasn’t writing, I wasn’t helping another writer either. Finally, I worked my way around that, with the thought that writers can offer me a taste of their work, to get me to buy later. It’s like a chocolate shop offering me a piece. Okay, that was solved. I could go back to browsing. But not really, I had to wrestle with my main problem again–I needed to write this blog.
But you know what? My love of reading is what led to my writing. And I’ve been in enough critique groups with writers who brazenly state that they don’t read much to see how that affects their writing–and it’s not good. Not good at all. So reading will help my writing, right?
Yep, problem solved. See you later, folks. I’m going to go read.