After losing use of my laptop for about three weeks I have been questioning my writing process.
Before home computers I lacked the confidence/commitment to finish/edit anything to a decent degree. Being a touch-typist didn't help either as paper & typewriter ribbon is expensive, and re-typing a page for the nth time is tedious. So, using computers liberated my writing, letting thoughts pour out through my touch-typist fingertips and be edited into coherence later.
Until my laptop stopped charging up properly, that is. I could see the battery percentage droping minute by minute, even while telling me that it was plugged in and charging. Panicking, I exported crucial folders and my Scrivener WiP in case the backups had failed (which they hadn't). Then I took it to my local IT fixer.
At first it was quite liberating to be forcibly removed from my WiP - I worked on other projects and poked at some corners with a duster. I wasn't worried about losing it, even though I couldn't open it without Scrivener, and I could play around on a iPad for other things.
My fixer returned it within a week and I was eager to dive in. Unfortunately, though, despite it being fine in his workshop, it was still impossible to use. I took photos & videos and returned it to my fixer.
That was week two, by which time twiddling my thumbs had become boring. I bought Scrivener for my iPad and imported my latest text but the UI was frustratingly different and I didn't have my organisation/research/comments from my laptop. Typing was a bit tricky too so I didn't get anything very productive done at all.
Anyhow, a week later I got my laptop back again and it has been working fine ever since so all's well that ends well.
My question, though, is: What if it hadn’t been fixed, or my IT fixer had taken longer? What does it say about my writing process if I am so reliant on one piece of equipment? Am I only a writer because of my laptop?
I’m still considering these questions, but wonder whether I should be making more effort to vary my writing processes so I’m not caught out again. Do other people run parallel processes? Does anyone work off paper and then type it up? Or use online writing tools that are seamlessly accessible from any browser? Please let me know how you'd cope.