These days that get away from me are definitely magnified by the no-room-for-error-ness of the rest of my available work time. I got about a half days’ worth of work done, and it should have been more than that. Not, perhaps, a full work day given some of the distractions, but it should have been more. Alas, what can I do?
Nothing, really, except to let it go and just make sure I hit my mark tomorrow. What I miss from here on out is simple money out of our pockets, and that’s that. I don’t really have any desire to try and “make up” work after the new year. Nope. I think next year deserves to start with a clean slate. Make up needs to happen now, not tomorrow.
I still, actually, *can* make up some ground. I don’t think my ultimate goal is do-able, the first goal that I set…but I should be able to get damn near close to it. I just really need to bear down and cut out the distractions.
The writing was great today, again. Another 4 and a half pages, which plus my 4 pages from the day before means I’m only 4 and a half pages away tomorrow from being completely caught up from the couple days that I shirked my writing in favor of editing.
Tomorrow is going to be tough. I have an apartment issue and a couple paperwork things that need to be taken care of, and I have no idea at this point how involved that will be. What will make me feel fulfilled and confident is if I can just focus on working when I have those chances, and be able to get distracted and then come right back and work again. We’ll see…wish me luck.
The writing will be done. I can guarantee that. And, I guess despite how much I yammer on this blog over and over about my editing work, I really do have consistent success in hitting my goals. It’s not always to my plan, which is why I stress about it so much…but it does get there eventually.
Ha! That’s like the theme of my life. “Well, he got there eventually.”
Joe came over today and we talked for a while and even watched a little bit of the Niners game before it got bad and we lost (again). It was good to see him. I haven’t actually seen him for a couple months. We talked maybe about taking walks together after the new year, on like, Tuesdays or something like that. We used to talk on the phone every day, back in 2012 I think it was. Or 2011. As accountabilibuddies (buddies that hold each other accountble). Joe and I are similar in so many ways, but also different from each other in enough ways to be able to provide insight to each other. Although, I must say, neither Joe nor I really actually crave insight. It’s companionship, really. That’s what we offer each other. We’re both relatively secure in who we are, and we’re able mostly just to listen to the other. And sympathize.
He’s doing great. About to start rehearsals for a show out in the high desert, a show he’s getting paid for pretty well. So, that’s legitimately exciting. I also tried to get him back into writing. He was surprised and impressed to hear that I was almost done with a book, and we talked about doing a writers’ retreat at some point, which is this idea of going off somewhere for like two weeks to write a bunch of raw material in one big deluge, and then spend the next several months editing and refining it. Now that I’ve actually found the daily grind, that approach seems less important to me…but maybe doing a writers’ retreat AFTER writing all the raw material is the way to go. Read it, share it, refine it, rewrite it for a couple weeks with a group of other writers. Maybe that’s the ticket. I don’t know. We’ll see. Just regardless, it would be very cool to go off somewhere and write for a couple weeks. I think Humboldt would be an amazing place to do it, too. It’s so pretty up there. Especially in the early summer or the late summer. May/June and September are really the only two times of year where the weather is pretty consistently amazing.
It’s an idea I’ve had now for a couple years, last summer I think I thought about it, but I haven’t done anything with it. And, like I said, I’ve really found my day-in-day-out routine now for writing…I don’t need a two week stretch to come up with raw material.
Anyway…I’m off to bed. I hope I get more work done tomorrow than I did today. These distractions will only get worse as the week goes on and we get closer to going-out-of-town-times. Wish me luck, I need it. But, hey…at least the writing will get done, right? Right 🙂
Peace!