Back to Business...uh, well....

So this month we're talking about writing itself, and publishing, right? I probably had something bigger and grander planned for this post, but then, well, life happened. My husband had to have surgery, and instead of having time to write this up yesterday, I wound up waiting for the hospital to find my husband a room post-op. For three hours. After spending the morning in the waiting room waiting for him to come out of surgery. Shot the whole day.

Maybe that's a lesson right there. Life happens. Writing is not a 9-5 job for most authors I know, although many of us wish it could be (there are days I do too, but I actually like my job). I have a goal of 500 words per day. Not a huge amount, but when you hate writing first drafts like I do -- I am a champion reviser-- sometimes those words feel like pulling teeth. And I'm kind of in a funk right now. Graduate School ended in the beginning of December, and there were the holidays, and all this other stuff, and I had given myself permission to wait until January 1 to dive back into writing.

And then...well, stuff gets in the way. And now I'm turning into a champion procrastinator. I've tried to write some  every day, but I think I've made the 500 words, like, once. I'm just not feeling it, and I'm easily distracted. I think I need to go back to the beginning and read over the whole first 25,000 words and find the story again. Yeah, like I have time for that.

What was I saying...oh yeah. My advice for writers -- be flexible. Don't throw up your hands in despair if the time you set aside for writing gets eaten up by life's crap. I finally DID have time to work on my manuscript yesterday (and should have done it while waiting in the hospital, but there were too many distractions, and I had a book to read), and it was during my son's basketball practice. I find those times ideal for writing, when I have to be somewhere and not engaged with what's going on. But sometimes that's what you have to do to get it done.

Some people can sleep anywhere, I have learned to write anywhere. And now it really IS back to business for me. I have three books to work on this year, and one new edition to get out into the world. No more time for distractions.

Look, shiny!