A day in the life of a freelance writer

"Well," I said on Monday afternoon, crossing my arms and turning in my desk chair to face Don. "I think I've had a reasonably productive day as a freelance writer."

The context of this comment came on the heels of getting laid off from my online day job last Friday. Rather than seeking another online position or an in-person job in the closest town, Don and I decided to throw ourselves full-time into freelance writing.

"You should write about that," he joked back. "A day in the life of a freelance writer."

I thought that was a good idea, so here goes.

I'm an early riser, so I was up by 4:30 am. I started a fire in the wood cookstove and boiled water for tea. I made sure there was enough water left in the kettle, which I kept on the wood cookstove, for Don's coffee later on.

By 5 am I was on the computer, working on my daily half-chapter for my latest category romance novel. This daily word count will allow me to complete the manuscript within a month. I drank my first cup of tea during this process.

Don was up by 6:30 am, so I poured his coffee, then kitted up in coat and mud boots to wade through the snow toward the barn: Cleaning up, feeding the cows, topping off their water. I was back in around 7 am, at which point I made myself another cup of tea, let the parrot out of her cage for some cage-free time, and caught up on the morning news. (The parrot likes to sit on my hand for about 90 minutes each morning, so I can't get any writing done during that time. It's my "read the news" time instead.)

Don and I had an appointment in the morning with our mechanic to get a repair job done on one of the vehicles. We drove into town, dropped off the vehicle, and on the way home we hammered out some story pitches for Backwoods Home Magazine/Self-Reliance, which Don wrote down while I drove.

After lunch, Don pushed some snow around with the tractor while I started sending pitches to various editors. I launched seven pitches at Lehman's (I write for their blog). My contact liked the ideas and said she has her content meeting tomorrow and will get back to me.

I received an unrelated email from the editor at Grit, so I took the opportunity to ask for the editorial calendars for both Grit and Mother Earth News so I could pitch accordingly. She wrote back a very nice email (and cc'd the MEN editor as well), saying she will like whatever I write, so just send some pitches. Poor ladies, I sent back no fewer than 18 ideas. It was late in the afternoon when I sent them, so I didn't expect to hear back for a day or two at least.

Meanwhile, Don started researching a new magazine to query regarding some of the interesting sights we saw on our last short trip to Montana we took in September. He also rough-finished a previously requested article for Backwoods Home Magazine which he hopes to finalize and submit within a day or two.

In the late afternoon, I went out to clean the barn, top off the cows' water tank, and feed them. We've been giving them a little extra food to help retain body heat, since we have bitterly cold temps moving in.

On Tuesday morning, after barn chores were finished, we helped Older Daughter box up her massive order of tankards for shipment. We walked the dog, then both sat down at our computers again. Don finished his Backwoods Home article and sent it to me for review. I threw in a load of laundry and began editing the article.

In the late morning, we requested a phone consultation with our Backwoods Home editor and told her about the job loss and our interest in pitching more stories. Normally this could be covered in an email, but we had a couple of unusual ideas to talk over with her, easier done on the phone.

After lunch, we finalized our list of about 25 pitches and sent it in to Backwoods Home. While Don worked on splitting some firewood, I started my half-chapter fiction writing for the day.

In the late afternoon, after barn chores and walking the dog, Don worked on some tax stuff (we have our appointment next week) while I edited and finalized the article he sent me earlier.

Once the various editors decide which pitches to accept, they'll assign due dates and (in some cases) word counts. We will calendar the due dates – we're rather obsessed with never missing a deadline – and start working on whatever article is due first.

If these pitches pay off – and we're reasonably confident most of them will – we should have a nice steady freelance income for the next couple of years, solely from the magazine writing. This doesn't include anything earned from the fiction side of things.

So yeah, that's a day in the life of a freelance writer. A lot of hustling, but a lot of freedom too. And it's all because I got laid off from my day job.