Coffee Shop Writing

There's been some discussion amongst the hard-scribbling coterie of Jungle Red on the merits of library writing. It certainly has it's appeal--quiet (or at least relative quiet, depending on your library of choice), the lack of household distractions (for those of us who don't have offices outside the home), and the set structure (one of the things we've been working at in our Writer's Challenge--a certain block of time set aside to do nothing but WRITE.)

All pluses, certainly. But I have to admit there is one big drawback for me. My local library doesn't have TEA. We all have our little addictions, our writing rituals, don't we? And mine is tea. I can make a pot at breakfast in the morning, nurse a first cup and then a second until lunch, then make another cup (or pot) in the late afternoon for that blessed second wind.

Now it doesn't matter how tepid and scummy that cup of tea gets, as long as it's next to my keyboard and can be sipped occasionally. Silly? Yes. But it works. And I can't quite get my head around working TEA-LESS.

This started me thinking about our other writing rituals--whether we write with distraction or without, and just how exactly our brains are wired. I have a friend who writes with old movies playing on the DVD player. Another who writes with choral music for background. Others who write in the midst of household chaos.

I find I can't write to music, except very, very occasionally, Bach, or choral chant. I absolutely CANNOT write with the TV on. But--I am a coffee-shop-writer. I have my favorites, my local Panera or sometimes Starbucks. There is that structure. You give yourself two or three or four hours to do nothing but write. No laundry, no phone calls, no toilets to be cleaned or dinner to be prepped. And there is something about that level of ambient noise and the bustle of people coming and going and often other people working, that somehow stimulates the writing center of my brain.

It's an odd contradiction, and I wonder if there's some sort of logical scientific explanation for it. Something to look into, and in the meantime I'll keep debating over the library . . . do you think I could sneak in a thermos of TEA in my laptop bag?