like most writers, i hate writing. i'd rather clean toilets than write. i love having written, and i love – i mean you sit down at your desk, and half the time nothing good happens. but when something good happens when you're writing, it's a kind of magic that you find no other time. you disappear. you're sitting there and nothing happens and nothing happens, and you look at your watch, it's 5am, it's 5:30 am (why am i up, why am i not in bed?) and then, when you're lucky, something happens and the next thing you know, it's 7:30 and this time... you've vanished. and there's something on the paper that you can't even explain how it got there. and it's a wonderful feeling. it's like, for me, a kind of high that i don't get any other way, and that's why i find the time to do it.
– ruth reichl, garlic and sapphires, chapter 9