Inga M. Beck

Today I saw this entry in A.M. Shcultz’s blog (is that the right use of the apostrophe? I have no idea) about writers and their excessive coffee drinking http://www.amschultz.com/2/post/2012/08/wired-writers-drink-the-revolution.html

I liked reading that for a few reasons: 1) I too used to dream of associating with writers 2) I am a writer and 3) I loooove coffee and last but not least 4) I don’t think I would have finished my novella without it.

I never used to think about why I wanted to meet writers when I was a kid. It was just something that I thought would be cool but secretly I wanted to be one. It was a secret to myself too. I loved writing stories but being a writer somehow never crossed my mind because it is not what people would call a “proper career . Even when I tell people now when they ask me what I want to do with my life that I want to be a writer, 90% of the time I get the answer “oh that’s nice. But what are you REALLY going to do? Like, how are you going to make a living?” Honestly, I don’t see why people do that. You didn’t ask me how I was gonna have the money to go to the store and buy some food, you asked me what I wanted to do with my life. I want to write. That is my answer. Anything else is secondary, maybe I’ll have to work some crappy part time job or start teaching or go into journalism or something to make a living, but the point is, I am a writer. It’s like Yvaine says in Neil Gaiman’s Stardust “there are shop boys, and there are boys who just happen to work in a shop for the time being.” Anything else I will do will not make me any different. I will still always be a writer, even if I never manage to sell a book or anything like that in my lifetime. I am a writer, I have convinced myself, now I just have to convince the rest of the world.

Now then, as a writer I fit into Schultz’s stereotype that loooves coffee. I started it kind of late though, it was while I was working on my first thesis I think two years ago (how time flies). It started off very slow, the coffee drinking and the writing, but as I got further a long, the more I struggled with it, the more I got into drinking coffee. And finally it was done. It was one of the best experiences I have had. Sure it was agonizing as I was working on it, I mean I had no idea what I was doing but I read so many books by Yoshimoto Banana that I think she will always be a strong influence in my writing from here on out. Her, and coffee. Then I did my next thesis a year later and that one was much easier. Every time I sat down at the computer I had a cup of coffee by my side. My trusted companion. And for that one I wrote a whole novella and en essay about the whole process. I regret that I have to admit though that coffee is never mentioned in the essay. Honestly I never thought of the fact until I read this entry from Schultz. I don’t think I would have managed it without coffee.

Now, I love nothing better than sitting down at my computer or with my pen and paper and writing. I do it way too little of course, I should spend most of my days sitting with a cup of coffee and writing because it is what I love doing. And on that note, I think I’ll get up and have my third cup of coffee of the day and see what happens next in the novella I’m working on… I think the answer may be in that third cup of coffee… maybe the fourth, we’ll see.