I’ve been away from the Room the last couple of weeks, traveling for my honeymoon. As we move from place to place, I try to steal moments for my writing. It’s not often that I get to visit new cities for pleasure instead of my freelance work. If I’m traveling for a predetermined story or assignment, my mind is already hyper-focused on the task at hand, leaving me with little capacity for additional free thought or experiencing my surroundings organically.
It’s been great so far. While I miss the comfort and familiar friendly faces of the Writers’ Room, I’m also appreciating the unique quality of writing on the road in the midst of the unfamiliar. As such, I thought I’d share a few of my tips for writing while traveling, whether you’re on the road for pleasure or work. Some of these might be obvious, but others were new to me.
Slow down. Fight the tourist’s pace.
Fight the urge to rush through exhibits, experiences, and tourist attractions. Try to steal a corner atop the church tower you just waited 3 hours to climb up. If you’re alone, all the better. I’ve found places to tuck myself away on top of Notre-Dame Cathedral and inside Florence’s Duomo. The spots are there, you just need to look. Make sure you’re not close to the edge of the roof! Once you’ve found your spot, jot down a few notes or take a moment of reflection to write in the moment.
Speed up. Embrace the city’s pace.
Okay, so you can’t always slow down—especially in busy cities—but there’s something to be gained from running with the locals and embracing their pace (sometimes that pace can also be very, very slow!) Do what they do. Become invisible. Pretend you live there. Embrace the same frenzied chaos in your writing, if only just for a moment to break you out of a block.
Find alone time.
This is easy if you’re a solo traveler, and I’ve most often written while traveling alone, but this is not always possible (like my honeymoon!) Take breaks from your travel partners—an afternoon or meet up for dinner. Take your own path at your own pace at a museum and meet up later, as mentioned above. Don’t be forced to rush your experiences or wait on others to move on. If you have kids with you, take moments when and where you can—rise early for a solo coffee, trade off time with a partner, or organize an activity that fully engages each family member on an individual level, like an audio tour or family friendly group class. It won’t be easy, but if you can manage even a few minutes of writing here and there, it’s well worth it.
Forget about home.
Stay in the moment, and don’t worry about people and things at home when possible. They will be there when you get back, renewed and refreshed. Don’t experience your trip at a fraction of your own consciousness.
Remember home.
Okay, so you can’t fully forget home, but you can take moments to reflect on your life and relationships as a whole. Journaling is great for this. Writing without the distraction of relationships, commitments, or the daily grind is a liberating experience. It can also help you see those relationships and commitments with a unique clarity that is impossible to attain when you’re in the thick of it. It’s not uncommon for someone to make a major life decision about life back home when traveling in a new place. I’ve also found it particularly helpful in writing memoir, essays, and generating new ideas.
Take photos, not just for fun.
You’re traveling and probably taking photos for your memories or budding hobby. But you should also utilize photos as a form of note-taking. Can’t spare a minute to jot down some notes about the amazing site you just visited? Take photos of the scenery and its details for your records. Prioritize documenting those sensory details that can evade you later over the nuts and bolts facts that can be verified during your fact-checking phase. Also, try recording yourself on your phone if you don’t feel like snapping photos.
Travel light.
This one seems obvious, but the less physically encumbered you are, the more liberated in thought you can become. Carry-ons are your friend. So are tiny notebooks! I have a shelf of tiny filled notebooks from all of my travels.
Take trains.
You can write anywhere—train, plane, automobile (assuming you’re not actively driving)— but not all modes of transportation are equally conducive to writing. Between the comfort, spacing, natural light, and historic tradition of writers writing on trains, rail travel matches the ebb and flow of the writer’s pace wonderfully (check out Amtrak’s Writer’s Residency!)
Talk to strangers.
You’re not truly experiencing an inhabited place if you avoid speaking to actual people. Sure, there may be language barriers, but it’s amazing how far you can get with a few basic, kind words and human intuition. Also, selfishly, you miss out on a whole area of writing inspiration—spoken words, snippets of conversations—if you’re not tuned into other people and the art of interaction.
—2018 Writers’ Room Fellow Gabriella Gage
