New Routines

There are many stressful things about moving house, not least of which is the complete disruption to your daily routines. Everything's in a different place, you don't know where to find things for a long time, you have to get used to doing everything slightly differently.

Even my writing routines got disrupted. I did no writing at all for about a month after moving - I felt I really couldn't get back to normal life while there were still boxes to unpack. But now the boxes are mostly unpacked, most things that we use every day have a place, and I have got back into writing.

My journey to work is longer now. The train route I'm on is a slower trek into London, and I have a longer walk to the station. This has put a bit of dent in my early morning writing routine. From the old place, I would leave the house at 6:30 am, to get into the West End for 7:30, and I would sit in Starbucks for an hour writing before going to work. Now, in order to get to the West End for 7:30, I have to leave the house at 6:00 am. That means a 5:30 start if I skip the shower and other morning customs - generally I prefer to have an hour.

However, in the new house I have a bigger writing space - in fact I have a study, a whole room to myself to write in - in the other house I only had a writing corner. This morning I decided to try out a new routine - getting up early to write at home before work.

So I set the alarm for 5:30 am. I spent an hour writing, in my pyjamas (with cup of tea, of course). I then had an hour to get ready for work, and although I had to catch a later train than usual, I was still at my desk for the day job by 9:00 am. By the time I got there, I'd been awake for three and a half hours and felt that I'd already done something productive with my day.

I think I'm going to stick with this routine. It means I will spend a bit more time in our new house, I'll save a bit of money by not buying quite so many Starbucks breakfasts, and it means I get the writing time in before I even leave home in the morning. It did take me a while to get going this morning, and I'd had two cups of tea before I even left the house. but it's just a matter of getting used to a new routine. It's good for me to get out of the rut sometimes.

I'm not planning on giving up the Starbucks mornings completely. This is just a way of cutting back, without cutting back on the writing. After all, once upon a time I thought I could never write away from my little writing corner, and my Starbucks mornings proved that one wrong.

And there is something gloriously decadent about writing in one's pyjamas.