Guest post by Michele Corriel

This week I’m out of town doing a marathon of school visits in Sarasota, Florida. My friend Michele Corriel has graciously agreed to do a guest post.

I used to have a day job. I got up in the morning, shoved breakfast in my mouth and in the mouths of my family and scooted out the door into traffic to show up at an office. The good part was that I got a monthly paycheck. The bad part … well, you know the bad part.

That was almost ten years ago.

It wasn’t that I didn’t love my job. I was a journalist and a pretty good one. I’d won tons of awards. But one day the person who owned the newspaper (yes, it was owned by one person!) sold the paper. So it was either join a conglomerate whose only care was to improve the bottom line or go out on my own.

I decided, with encouragement from a friend, to try freelance writing. This would allow me to write from home, manage my own time, work on my novels, and get paid. And although I’ve had a few bumps along the way, I’ve never looked back. Almost every year since I started freelancing I’ve made about the same amount of money I made while working at the newspaper. But it wasn’t easy.

Nobody told me when you first start freelancing you need to take every job that comes along. I wrote for bridal shows, Christmas catalogs, community newsletters, animal shelters, basically I wrote for anybody who would pay me. But I also made great headway on my own work, which kept me writing all that other junk. It also got me a great reputation. I never missed a deadline. I never handed in anything without quotes from reliable sources. And, no matter how much someone paid me, I never sent off anything that wasn’t the best thing I could write about that subject.

I started to send out queries to magazines I wanted to write for … and I got assignments from them, too. In fact, for a few years I had a regular art column in Frontier Airlines’ magazine, wild blue yonder.

With all that under my belt I seriously started to work on a novel I’d been thinking about. And I’d gotten myself into excellent writing shape. By that I mean I’d organized my day to produce as much work as I could in the time I had. I had to be finished by 3 pm to pick my daughter up from school and get her to swimming. So I woke up early, got my husband and my daughter out the door, and got up to my office by 9 am every day. I’d break for lunch (one hour) and then finish up by 3 or so. I still keep this schedule although I don’t have to pick my daughter up anymore (she’s driving!).

My secret to a successful writing life is to know my own strengths and weaknesses: I’m more creative in the morning and more able to do drudgery work (transcribing interviews, editing work or taking notes) in the afternoons. And I always find time for an hour of reading. It’s very important to feed your reading brain.

Last year I had my first middle grade novel published and my next book will be out in 2012. I obtained a great agent and as my freelance work levels off my personal writing increases.

Michele Corriel lives and writes in Belgrade, Montana, where she is also the Regional Advisor for the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. Her debut middle-grade novel, FAIRVIEW FELINES: A NEWSPAPER MYSTERY (Blooming Tree/Tire Swing Press) came out last fall. Her second book, WEIRD ROCKS (Mountain Press), will be out Spring 2012. She is represented by The McVeigh Agency.

QED: It pays to plan ahead!

Ten days ago I had today’s post all ready. It started like this:

With all the things to worry about a year before retiring—paycheck, benefits, isolation—the issue most occuping my mind at the moment is: What am I going to do with all the books in my office? (I think I’m worrying about things like this because that way my brain is engaged and isn’t worrying about paycheck, benefits, isolation.)

It went on from there about how I had a hard time getting rid of books even when I knew I would never read them again, and how there are boxes of books in our attic that I haven’t opened since we moved to this house 18 years ago, etc. We live in an old house with nice big windows and have a lot of art hanging on the walls, so there’s not much room for more bookcases. I had considered the space between the window and the walls in my study, but it seemed impossibly narrow. I really felt stuck.

So I knew it was counter-productive to go to the local Borders’ closeout sale last weekend, since if I bought yet more books, what would I do with them?

I went anyway, and of course I got some books. But! I also got:

Two of them! As you can see, there's a very narrow space between the wall and the window (and on the other side too) and these fit without an inch to spare. They're solid wood (except for the back; who cares), eight feet tall, $35 each! I called dibs on these two and got Greg to come over and remove them from the wall, and we transported them home very slowly, and here they are. One shelf is already full of my knitting stash and another two hold backup copies of some of my books, but the rest are just waiting for my office collection.

I don’t know that it would have occurred to me even to find out if the bookcases were for sale if I hadn’t been obsessing about stuffing the beautiful books from my offices into boxes come next May, so it turns out that a bit of worry can be a good thing. (I also queried a children's writing correspondence school to see if they need instructors; they're in a hiring freeze and will hold my application. So by writing now I'm a year ahead of the people who will apply between now and when I retire.)

And now with that worry solved, I can start thinking about paycheck, benefits, isolation.

P.S. While I had my camera out, I arranged one copy of each of my books in order of publication date and took their portrait.

The Four Fears

So I combined the worry gene I got from my mother with the methodical gene I got from my father and divided my fears/concerns about retirement into four categories. What do you think?

 

1. Financial (the obvious): Paycheck, benefits (health insurance is the biggie), plus all those benefits you get that you don’t think of until you have to pay for them yourself. For me, the most important of these will be gym membership, discounts at various stores, consulting jobs that won’t be available to me once I’m no longer affiliated with the university.

2. Psychological: Part of my self-definition is “I’m a college professor.” Will I feel something missing when I can’t say that? Also, at all but the most abysmal jobs (and my job is far from abysmal), you get strokes. You do in writing too, but writing is also a lot about rejection—rejections from agents and editors, bad reviews, critical emails from readers. Will they hurt more when I don’t have the comfort of students saying nice things to/about me, and colleagues telling me I do a good job?

 

3. Social: I know that a lot of my work friendships will end when I’m no longer in daily contact with people. If you run into someone in the hall, it’s easy to go out for lunch together. Will I make the effort to call people? Will they make the effort to call me? How will I make new friends?

 4. Writing: This may sound weird, but will I actually write less? I’m never as productive over the summer as I think I’ll be. Will that be true when I’m on constant summer break? Or conversely, will I forget to give myself time off, and write all the time? Another issue is that I write for young adults. Where will I meet young adults, if not in the classroom?

Some of these overlap. For instance, financial + psychological: I’ve never been supported by anyone but my parents, and although my husband is generously and cheerfully ready to pick up anything I’m unable to pay for, I’m not ready for that.

Which of these—if any—concern you the most as you contemplate retirement? Those of you who have already done it—how did you deal with these issues, and what haven’t I thought of? What other categories should we explore together?

P.S. I plan to post every Wednesday. I already have a great bunch of guest bloggers lined up and would love more, so please let me know if you’re interested.