I’m about to embark on yet another project. For those of you who know me, this isn’t much
of a surprise. I’m very
project-focused. In fact, were my blog a
drinking game, most of the regular readers would be half-soused if the drinking
word was “project.” It’s not surprising
that the universe found me a job at a school that uses the Project Approach to
educate its children. I’m all about the
focused effort toward a goal that is the project.
I’m a bit at an ebb tide right now. In fact, last night I started to write an
essay about my ebb tide, but found I didn’t have enough energy to parse out
what exactly that means and then format those thoughts into legible sentences,
let alone paragraphs. I can tell you
that I don’t have a lot of extra oomph right now. And that I don’t want to be a lot of things I
usually am happy to be. Farmer for one,
that’s currently on hold. The yard is a mess. Enthusiastic athlete, that’s another
one. Running (jogging, really) has been
on hold, because every time I do it, I hurt my foot. I’m just doing a bit of walking in the
mornings for now. Homemaker, there’s another thing I’m not really interested in
right now. I’m cooking at a minimal level
to feed myself and doing just a bit of cleaning to keep the house in barely
contained order. But that’s it.
I think this feeling will pass. It feels temporary. I might just be overly tired—I haven’t really
been sleeping very well the past few weeks—or hunkering down for the cold
winter. Maybe my ancient farmer within
wants me to rest after the harvest, despite the fact I never really got around
to harvesting this year.
So while I’m waiting for the flood tide to return, here’s
what I’m doing: I’m writing 500 words a
day from tomorrow until the end of the year.
That’s 500 words times 61 days.
I’ll have 30,500 words come December 31.
30,500 words of what, you ask?
Well, that would be the new novel I started in July and wrote daily
until school started to ramp up again.
My plan is to get a first draft (hence the project) and then do
something I’ve never actually done:
revise that first draft into something actually good.
I’ve written about 17,000 words already, mostly in chunks
larger than 500 words. That plus my
30,500 to come will have me ending up short of the NaNoWriMo goal of 50,000,
(and with two months instead of one) but that’s fine. Ebb tide is saying NaNoWriMo isn’t really
doable this year. So I’ll adapt. I know I can write 500 words in about 20
minutes and I feel like I can find 20 minutes per day from now until the end of
the year. And I know that I feel better
having written. And I know I just want
the thing to get written. And then I want
it to be better.
I might have time to throw in an essay for the blog now and
then, but if I don’t, maybe I’ll post a bit or piece of what I’m working
on. But perhaps not. We shall see.
At any rate, I’m off on another adventure. Wish me luck.
Perhaps you're just tired of pushing yourself. Your body and mind need a break. I think that focusing on your writing will be a good way to let your brain recharge. Also, it could be the writer in you taking over for a bit. Sometimes those words just want to come out, everything else be damned.
ReplyDeleteI think you are right. And reading this essay two weeks after I wrote it, I think I was overly tired. I wasn't sleeping well and there was a lot of brouhaha around my birthday. I feel more energetic now, thank goodness.
ReplyDeleteI am excited to hear how your ebb tide ends up flowing.
ReplyDelete