Top 10 Ways to Tell You’re a Freelance Writer
September 4, 2009 by Deb Ng
Filed under Cool stuff for writers
Are you someone who writes for a living but you’re not sure if you qualify to use the term “freelance writer” in your job description? Do you think of yourself as a freelancer, but aren’t sure if everyone else does? Fear not, this handy guide will put you in the know. Behold:
Top 10 Ways to Tell if You’re a Freelance Writer
10. Your friends and neighbors drop in any time they want because you’re home all the time
If you had a real job, you wouldn’t be at home. Freelancing means you’re available for coffee cake and back fence commiseration. No matter how many times you insist you really do work, no one actually believes it.
9. Being dressed up means you’re wearing your clean sweats
No laundry problem in your house, because you don’t have to change clothes several times a day. No stocking, suit jackets or business casual for you. You wear the same comfy sweats every day because who is going to see them? If your family are the only ones who think you smell a little ripe, it doesn’t count. Besides, it keeps the neighbors from dropping in unannounced for coffee.
8. You find yourself hunting up scraps of paper whenever you’re offline to write down the ideas in your head
Everything is fodder for a blog post or article. Sometimes you even want to pull over in the car to write down ideas. If you’ve ever told your kids to remember a phrase, or ask your husband to “write this down” you are, indeed, a freelance writer.
7. You amaze your friends with your bits of trivia and information regarding topics no one else has no use for
All those articles you had to write about pallet racks or septic system repair? No one cares, not even the polite friends.
6. The mailman is your best friend
We hear “the check is in the mail a lot.” Opening that mailbox to find a window envelope with its contents made payable to us, is the icing on the freelance writing cake.
5. The size of your jeans goes up every few months
Walking from the desk to the fridge several days does not constitute “exercise” no matter how often we try to convince our selves otherwise.
4. You know the winners of all the VH-1 and Bravo reality TV shows for the past two years
Even though the television is only on for “background” noise you’re paying attention, aren’t you?
3. When folks ask you who you work for you drop a long explanation rather than a name
It’s so much easier to explain what we do, than who we do it for.
2. You’re working well into the night because you spent the day on the beach or at the mall
Flexibility rocks.
1. Your commute consists of walking down the hall
No traffic jams. No subways. No exhaust. No smog. No regrets.
And…
Your wardrobe budget is much smaller. Working in comfy pajamas is awesome.
So, so true. Especially the part about all the reality tv shows. My friends don’t understand that it’s not my fault that Real Chance of Love comes on just as I’m getting ready to work. They also don’t understand that working from my laptop means that Twitter and Facebook are never far away. So what if I update my statuses 50 times a day? The things I post there, they get to say to the guy in the next cubicle. I don’t have a cubicle or a coworker so I gotta tell somebody!
I once worked late into the night because a Top Chef marathon was on…
Great post Deb! 1,2,3 and 9 are so very true
Thanks, I forgot to include the part where you learn to fluently speak “dog” because he’s the only one to talk to sometimes.
Didn’t take me long to figure out my dog was telling me to “step away from that computer and take me for a walk!”
And my dog freaks out every time I leave the house now because I do it so rarely. Every time I go to Walmart, she acts like I’m abandoning her.
this is great I am a dietitian so i can help you all prevent the weight gain LOL Rebecca
Feel Free to pitch an article about keeping healthy as a freelaner, Rebecca!
Rebecca, if your pitch to Deb contains the phrase “carrot sticks” in there anywhere, I’m outta here!
Jim: no worries no carrot sticks in there
He breathes a sigh of relief.
oh thats a great idea Deb, I will draft something for you to look at and email you
Rebecca
[snorts]
I don’t know how many times people have said I didn’t have a ‘real’ job. Those same people like to borrow the ‘fake money’ I make, too.
I also get “Oh, so you’re writing a book?”
Which is not offensive, just an interesting assumption. Then I have to disappoint them that I’m not a future famous-author-to-be.
“Um no, I write articles and er, stuff like that. Yeah, like this one article about H1N1…”
And their eyes glaze over…
Jennifer, ugh, the “glaze over.” I just wrote a post about that very thing today (though it’s about my interest in music, which also just happens to what I write about). You just want to slap them out of it. (Or is that just the angry, jaded New Yorker in me?)
Since I’ve been home the last 4 months and finally said “no more temping!”, I think I’ve done laundry twice, maybe three times. Sweet!
Since I also gave up my cable, the 5 snowy channels I get aren’t enough to bother with background noise. After all, I have Twitter and Facebook for that.
My dog also reacts strangely when I leave the house now. Even if I go to the store, when I come back he has the energy of a puppy (he’s 10), greeting me like I’d left him for dead. Though he does spend most of his time in the bathroom away from the clacking of the laptop keys. He’s never sure when he’ll hear the unique timbre of Ctrl-Alt-Delete (which always means I’m pissed off at the computer). To him, that aural signal is a sure sign he better hightail it out of the room to get out of the path of my wrath.
LOL… I have to say this post was a lot of fun to read. I kept imagining it with a pic to illustrate each point, some a bit scary…
On the serious side. I get more done, when I keep a schedule, and get dressed reasonably, and the like. Sometimes just getting out to a coffee shop helps my productivity a lot, enough that I am thinking about trying a co-working space in my community here in Austin.
ahhh, it occurs to me that you forgot one point: “You know you’re a freelancer when your caffeine bill exceeds your utility bill.”
>“You know you’re a freelancer when your caffeine bill exceeds your utility bill.”
Sob. This is why it’s so much harder to be a pregnant freelancer: no caffeine! Argh!
Sorry Jennifer but I am thinking you are right…my wife had trouble with that even tho she was not freelancing at the time…
I had to go check out my house for hidden cameras, because I swear Deb wrote this after spending a week watching me at home…so glad it’s not just me! Now I feel like I am officially a freelancer. Thanks for a great pick-me-up, Deb!
I know I am a freelance writer when no one seems to understand what I do for a living. I tried to explain but somehow they don’t understand. I also know that I am a freelance writer when my only commute is going to the room next to my bedroom for work.
This is all so true and so funny! I have been known to chant a new idea while driving until I get to a light and can write it down. In my purse and all over my house are little scraps of paper with ideas I have written down and sometimes at the store when I pull out my wallet a few forgotten ideas are uncovered. Lol!