Daywalkers

One of the major advantages of being a freelance writer is the fact that you get to set your own schedule. People hire you and generally don’t worry about when it gets done, as long as you hit your milestones on the schedule you’ve agreed on.

One of the major disadvantages of being a freelance writer is the fact that the people that hire you generally have to attend early morning meetings about the project, and sometimes want you to join in via conference call.

Now, I’m a night owl. Always have been. I generally start getting creative around 10:00 PM, and do some of my best work in the wee hours. Conversely, that means I am not at all human in a 9:00 AM meeting because that’s about three hours before my preferred wake-up time.

I usually tell my clients that it’s easier to get hold of me in the afternoon, and let them think I’m beavering away at massive piles of work all morning. As long as they get their proof by Friday, does it really matter if I’m drooling onto my pillow until brunch?

But you get those clients that insist on an early-morning update, so I have to suck it up and work on their schedule, even though I know that if I called them at 2:30 AM to let them know the new ad was finished and would they like to hear it, they’d probably be a mite pissed.

It’s not fair. The world’s work schedules revolve around early risers, and everybody’s bought into it. Think about it, the only things open at 4:00 AM are cheap greasy spoons and dodgy convenience stores. You can’t get copies made, buy stamps or any of a hundred other things that office-dwellers take for granted.

Yeah, they may be making deals and hitting sales targets while I’m still snoring, but I’m whipping out deathless prose and eye-catching brochures while they’re staring – unseeing – at some infomercial way up in Deep Cable while waiting for the Ambien to kick in. One way is no more noble or productive than the other, so why do so many people think it is?

The early bird may get the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese.

And I much prefer cheese.