Saturday both loses and gains, when you no longer have a full time job. You don’t have the excitement of not having to drag yourself out of bed to commute to somewhere away from your home, to work hard for somebody else, doing things that may not be high in your list of great things in your life, then there’s the sometimes tedious commute back home and busily working at home to keep everything neat enough, and everyone there fed.
Saturday comes along, you can sleep in – luxurious! You’re more in charge of your tasks for the day, and can do things more in tune with what you really want to do (hopefully). You can loaf around, or get stuck into the projects that make your heart and mind sing. And so on.
When you retire from paid work, the demarkation between weekend and working week is more or less gone for you, you can sleep in and loaf around any, or every day, if you wish. But if you do that, you may lose any actual sense of purpose, if you’re not careful.
For some, their sport gives them that sense of purpose, and you can give your all to your preferred game on Saturday. Or if sport isn’t you ‘thing’ there are many other hobbies you can get stuck into on Saturday, working hard at what you love to do, and still have time for that sleep in, if wanted, because you’re more likely to be doing ‘your thing’ closer to home than a paid job might be.
If you have are a writer, as I am, you may have deadlines, editors waiting on your next book, things you have to do to promote your previous book written, and these things may have to be done on days of the weekend, possibly a Saturday …
(authors own photo)
But of course, that Saturday work can bring in book sales, or payment for workshops or other promotional duties. Book signings and sales, what happy work that can be, connecting with your readers!
Freelance writing, which can feel like not really working at all, because you’re doing what you love doing the most in life, you’re writing because you love it, not because your a paid writer.
For many writers, the money earnt is far less, than what they would ever be paid in a full time job, working for someone, or something, else. Working for ‘the man’. But doing what they love makes it all worthwhile for them, despite the lower earnings.
If you’re a freelance writer, writing a book with or without a publisher waiting for you to finish, Saturday may come and go, with you barely noticing, because that book you’re busily bringing into the world is the most important thing in your head.
You might find your characters intrude in every quiet moment you have, demanding you stop what you’re ‘supposed to’ be doing, and even if you were going to give yourself a break on a Saturday, after working hard on that novel, or whatever, during the working week, your characters demand you get back to work.
as name
book promotion when ideas and characters intrude
(author’s photos)
So on Saturday you may not have time for the normal ‘Saturday’ things, sports, or other hobby stuff, not when that book demands you put your focus into that.
And of course, for many people Saturday is when they have the time to do the shopping for the household. But when your weekdays are free from having to go to work, you can go and do the shopping on whichever day you want to.
You’ll find it far easier, and less stressful, with more and closer car parks available to you. There will be fewer people in the shops, so once you have all you need, you will get served more promptly, at the checkout.
Quicker, easier, but sometimes the shops may not be as well stocked as they may be on the busier of Saturday, depending on what time you do your big shop. Decisions, decisions, if you’re a writer, you can look at the realities and make your own choices. Shop on Saturday, or another day, it’s up to you!
So being a writer, whether to do a ‘working day’ and ‘weekend day’ or not, is up to you, and maybe your bank balance – you are a writer, you write, words are your tools for work, and the things you love the most, writing, shaping the words, making sense of life, and putting it, ultimately onto a page for others to read.
I say, rejoice in your choice, whatever it is!
Carolyn Cordon - Creative 
I’ve been unemployed for 6 years. It’s something that takes time to get into. Working in paid-work long-term can create an ingrained belief about the weekend having to be “different” and somehow more exciting and pleasurable than Monday to Friday. So when I stopped working I had this constant feeling of guilt and tried to make weekends different by drinking. Well then I had a drink and depression problem. I realised I needed to see a psychiatrist to get some help with ALL of my ingrained thinking patterns, so that I could create a Sunday-to-Sunday life full of fun, health stuff, that improved my self-care, self-esteem and created a sense of spaciousness wherein I no longer felt guilt. Or some desperate need to “make” the weekend “more exciting” – which really, when you reflect on it, is madness?
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I gave up full time work when my husb and and I had our child, who is now 26 years old. I’ve done a couple of part time paid jobs since then, but they weren’t ideal, and caused too much stress, in different ways.
My life now, being on a disability support pension (was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis in 2010), and getting tiny bits of money through my creative writing, at various and sometimes random times in each year.
Being beholden to only myself and not to ‘The Man’ feels good, liberating.
But I have to keep on at myself too, so I don’t slack off too much, and I keep on writing, if I’m going to call myself a writer, which I most certainly do.
Writing, blogging, Editing the local Town’s Newsletter, President of a writing group. These are what I ‘do’ they are my work. It’s one of those things, when you’re doing something you love to do, work feels like play, and you don’t mind when you work, anytime is good.
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Needing excitement all of the time can be a problem, I can see that. Life has peaks and troughs, naturally, there is a time for the high octane stuff, a time for quieter, more reflective times. Thank oyu so much for your own reflective comments!
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