routines and murakami and ai

also where i'm at, geographically-speaking

Today's post was going to be a five things but then I realized that I'd temporarily up and left the States and hadn't really told anyone on here, although maybe posting my little Notes at 4am EST was a bit of a hint. Thought a little recap was due (I do later get derailed into the subject of routines and the recent Murakami backlash, which, lol).

About a year ago, I was deciding whether/when to quit my corporate job, and ever since I did around two months later, I've felt great (really) — but also in a weird little state of in-between, like I couldn't fully relax yet because in the back of my mind, I was still waiting to make my next big decision/change. 

So anyway, not that this is my big decision, but I'm in Spain for the time being. This isn't going to become a travel blog, mostly because more than discovering new places, what I enjoy is setting up routines in places that from new, slowly become familiar. I admire people who can go months stepping in and out of planes while maintaining the thrill of travel, but it's not for me. But I did want to tell you where I am, just in case I drop something like "I read [x] while in Portugal for the weekend," and you don't think I flew seven hours to have dinner in Lisbon.

I was in Dublin for a few days before getting here (and thus, somewhat dismantling my previous paragraph's little thesis), where I walked miles and miles, saw a wonderful and frankly very long play, nearly threw up on a tour bus to Kilkenny, took dozens of photos of trees, had one of the best slices of vegan pizza I've ever had, fulfilled my Guinness quota for the year, and broke in my new boots. By the end of my stay, I wished I'd planned to spend a couple more days in Ireland, which is always the hallmark of a good trip.

Now I've been in Spain for almost a week and have visited approximately fifteen supermarkets in search of nutritional yeast (found some yesterday). I haven't been new somewhere in a long time — it's nice, a little like building a life from scratch, except that I get to take into account everything that has and hasn't worked for me in the past.

Through years of trial and error, for instance, I’ve learned that I personally work best with a relatively strict morning routine. It's not always fun to adhere to so I occasionally don't, but if I'm unproductive in the morning, there's a high chance I'll have to write off the entire day. However, if I get a few uninterrupted hours of work done in the morning, not only will I feel an obnoxious sense of accomplishment, I am also likely to carry that industriousness into the afternoon. 

As I set up my routine here, it's been relatively easy — partly because I'm still a little isolated here and left most of my friends and family on the other side of the Atlantic, partly because I want to write, and partly it is (miraculously) my job to do so — to wake up early, make my little cup of disgusting instant coffee that I will regret buying every day until it is done, journal for fortyish minutes, and then write at my desk for the next few hours, by the end of which I need several minutes of stretching to alleviate my frequently-in-pain back. 

It is lucky, I know, to be able to do this. But routines have always worked well for me, and I've found them even more valuable now that I work alone and could, presumably, write whenever I want (this never works). 

Routines are very personal things that creatives often share because they're an integral part of The Process that people get curious about, and yet I've found that these same curious people tend to get rather neurotic about their ability and/or willingness to adopt someone else's routine. They become quite concerned with how realistic it is for other people to follow someone’s personal routine, and if it isn’t realistic, well, then, how is it fair. It’s an interesting, albeit slightly fabricated, dilemma.

Over the last few days, a screenshot from Haruki Murakami's 2004 interview with The Paris Review has been making the rounds on Twitter. In it, Murakami says the following:

When I’m in writing mode for a novel, I get up at four a.m. and work for five to six hours. In the afternoon, I run for ten kilometers or swim for fifteen hundred meters (or do both), then I read a bit and listen to some music. I go to bed at nine p.m. I keep to this routine every day without variation. The repetition itself becomes the important thing; it’s a form of mesmerism. I mesmerize myself to reach a deeper state of mind. But to hold to such repetition for so long — six months to a year — requires a good amount of mental and physical strength. In that sense, writing a long novel is like survival training. Physical strength is as necessary as artistic sensitivity.

People have been mocking this, and I get it. It's intense and not particularly relatable. Murakami is a man and has no children and is in a privileged position to afford this sort of lifestyle, while many writers (even successful ones!) need to hold down second jobs in addition to writing to make ends meet. And listen, even as someone who enjoys his books, I will never turn down an opportunity to poke fun at Murakami.

This is my favorite tweet about Murakami. (Screenshot via X/@racecard_driver)

But there is something odd and exhausting about the backlash to a successful writer sharing his writing routine — which he acknowledges is not easy — in a 20-year-old interview. Part of it, I think, is anger, maybe even some bitterness, that most of us do not have the opportunity to spend several hours a day exercising and reading. It is a luxury, to wield such control over your own time. So I understand, even though I suspect that even if we all did have the opportunity, we still wouldn't spend our time like he does while in "writing mode." Again, it is not easy.