I’m not sure how it took me 9 days to notice this, but I’m not listening to any music while I write this month, and that’s something that hardly ever happens. Not only do I usually listen to music while I write, but I also usually make up soundtracks for stories as I write them. But not this time. Not so far. I’m sure it could all change tomorrow, but for some reason the thought of listening to music while working on this story never even occurred to me. Very strange.

It might be a good thing, though. On previous writing projects I’d sometimes find that I’d be writing scenes to the pace of what I was listening to. Sometimes I’d even work in lyrics or ideas I got from lyrics as I listened. I never gave any thought to whether or not this was good for my writing — it was just the way I’d done it since college, basically. And yet this time, silence. It’s too early for me to say if the writing’s any better or worse for the absence of music, because I haven’t read any of this thing yet and I have no plans to until I’m done.

One difference brought on by the lack of music is that I’m not using the songs I’m hearing to help me shape the theme or idea of the story. I’d allow myself to be very influenced by whatever I was listening to, and so it’s no surprise that it was a song that made me realize I hadn’t been listening to music this time around. While working today, I heard this lyric from Bruce Springsteen’s Devils & Dust and I saw that my main character was potentially being influenced by it:

I got God on my side
I’m just trying to survive
What if what you do to survive
Kills the things you love
Fear’s a powerful thing

That will probably be kicking around in my head as I work though this week’s section of the plot and what’s driving my main character to do what he’s doing. Right now the story’s at a bit more than 19,000 words, which is probably the most I’ve ever written without headphones on.

After my mini-revelation about music, I got into a conversation with a coworker who needs me to do some work for him on Wednesday. It’s not a huge project, but to do it right it takes more than half a day. And I told him that I already have another project for Wednesday that will require almost a full day to do. So all of a sudden I’m booked for potentially a day and a half worth of work, and I’ve gotta squeeze 2,000 words in there as well. I can’t wait to see how I pull that off. I can guarantee I’ll be blasting something out of the headphones while I’m at the office.