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#1000wordsofsummer 2023, Day Eight

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Can you believe it? I’ve hit my target, and it’s only the middle of the afternoon!

Photo credit: Erwan Hesry on Unsplash

If we lived in a perfect world, I could devote the entire weekend to working on my book. Alas, the world is imperfect. The house is in desperate need of cleaning, errands need to be run, I have to take dinner to Mom both tonight and tomorrow night since my sister leaves tomorrow for a business trip to Iceland (don’t get me started on her efforts to micromanage how I do this), and billable work needs to be done since I’ve run the calculations for how much extra money my recent appendectomy is going to cost out of pocket, and It Ain’t Good. (Especially since this year is already proving to be expensive with Ned’s chemo, the house in desperate need of painting, my formerly trusty car requiring many pricey repairs over the past few months, and my even more desperate need for new glasses.)

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#1000wordsofsummer 2023, Day Seven

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Photo credit: Hana El Zohiry on Unsplash

Halfway through the challenge. I’m creating a lot of new material. Just not quite certain what I’m going to do with all of it.

The answer, of course, is to be creative. Like that’s so easy.

Tonight, I had The Late Show with Stephen Colbert on in the background while I was brushing my teeth. Out of respect and solidarity for the writers who are on strike, they’re running older episodes. (I promise, this is going somewhere.)

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#1000wordsofsummer 2023, Day Six

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As managing editor of Tuxedo Cat Press, Charlotte clearly has complete confidence in TCP’s leading author

Nearly 1,100 words tonight. The biggest issue is going to be weaving all this new material into the existing book. But at least the material finally exists. That’s a big deal. So grateful to Jami Attenberg and the #1000wordsofsummer challenge for getting me moving on this!

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#1000wordsofsummer 2023, Day Five

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Photo by Vladislav Muslakov on Unsplash

One thousand words. On the nose.

No two ways about it: the only reason I wrote tonight was this challenge–that, and the support of the people who are following along with me. Because I’m so exhausted I can hardly stay awake.

I’m not certain whether or not it’s a good thing, this writing while barely conscious.

I suppose it is, because (a) the words are being written, (b) the scenes are being crafted, and (c) it’s imposing discipline. Without the challenge and your support, I’d likely get to the end of this week without knowing how things are going to play out between two hard-headed characters. Instead, I have a pretty good idea of where it’s all going, even if what I’m creating at this point falls short of any polished draft.

Nodding off here, so I’ll bid you adieu.

#1000wordsofsummer 2023, Day Four

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My supervisor, Ned

It occurred to me last night that I could get ahead on the challenge by writing more than 1,000 words per day. Then I reminded myself that the purpose of the challenge is not only to accumulate 14,000 words, but to develop a writing practice. A habit, if you will. Like brushing your teeth or washing your face. The point is to come back to it day after day until it’s an integral part of you, something you wouldn’t think of skipping.

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#1000wordsofsummer 2023, Day Three

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Sleepy Danny

One advantage of this challenge is that it forces me to do more than I would have done.

Take tonight, for instance. I’m exhausted. All I want to do is administer cat meds and bedtime snacks and go to bed myself. But before I could translate that urge into reality, I recognized that I hadn’t yet written my 1,000 words.

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#1000wordsofsummer 2023, Day Two

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Olivia, Editor-in-Chief of Tuxedo Cat Press

Quick note tonight.

An interesting weekend, and not just because I wrote over 2,000 words. Long conversation yesterday with a dear friend who’s had some huge news. Still dealing with the aftereffects of last weekend’s surgery, including ongoing fatigue, minor pain, and reactions to anesthesia. Meeting with the first of several potential house painters. Return of the “check engine” light, including vibration and rough idle, after spending literally thousands to fix my fifteen-year-old car barely two months ago.

And Olivia, Editor-in-Chief of Tuxedo Cat Press, deigning to recline on the back of my chair.

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#1000wordsofsummer 2023, Day One

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On my refrigerator

In the words of that great philosopher, Roseanne Roseannadanna, it’s always something.

I was on the fence about doing #1000wordsofsummer this year, because much of what I need to do with my book now is editing, not creating. Writing 1,000 words every day for fourteen days is great if you need to add 14,000 words to your project, but not so good if you really need to be paring down, replacing, rearranging, and reworking.

Parenthetically, I’d forgotten today was the start date. I’m still post-operative (appendectomy last Sunday morning), which means I’m low enough on energy that practically anything other than watching television requires genuine effort. I’ve been blessed with the assistance and support of amazing friends who’ve done everything from hang out with me at the hospital to driving me around and watering my garden so I could attempt to honor the 5-lb. lifting restriction imposed by the surgeon. In the end, though, I still need to pay for cat food, electricity, and car repairs, so by Tuesday, I was working part-time. As a result, by late evening, my post-operative brain wasn’t good for much more than computer solitaire.

All of which meant that the last thing on my mind was #1000wordsofsummer.

Until Jami Attenberg’s first email arrived this morning.

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Thoughts After Twenty-Six Years of Self-Employment

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Photo credit: Austin Neill on Unsplash

If you’d asked me twenty-six years ago where I thought I’d be today, working in my mechanic’s waiting room would not have been one of the answers.

Here I am anyway.

Turns out, flexibility of location is an enormous benefit of self-employment. You learn to work practically anywhere: in my office, a client’s office, the aforesaid mechanic’s waiting room. In libraries, airports, airplanes. In restaurants, hotel rooms, hotel lobbies, churches. On my porch, at my mother’s house, in the back of an airport limousine. Pretty much anyplace with a flat surface is a place where I can work. (I once took a stack of documents to a dance recital so I could keep reading while waiting for the curtain to rise.)

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Glimmer

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Photo credit: Arek Socha on Pixabay

I really thought my online expedition would do the trick.

At least once or twice a day, I get an email from Road Scholar. This is a company that leads tour groups all over the world. One of the differences between Road Scholar and other tour companies is that Road Scholar is all about education. They don’t just show you the animals—they tell you what they are and lots of information about them. You may also learn about the history of the region where you’re traveling. For a certain species of geek (me), this is a ton of fun.

In late winter, I received an email for an online expedition to the Arctic. Four days, three hours per day, plus lists of reference materials and suggested reading.

By this point, I was painfully aware that despite my internet research, I knew practically nothing about the Arctic. When you’re writing a book set largely at the North Pole, this can be problematic. After all, it’s not realistic to assume that the characters will never go outside, so what will they see? What birds and animals will be around? Also, what will they eat? It’s not as though they’re going to be having chicken and pork since they don’t have pigs and chickens, so what will the menu look like?

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