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I feel I have to apologize for not having given an entry for awhile, but strangely, I find, sometimes, that writing the blog feels like writing to me. Which means that some days writing the blog seems to take the edge off that compulsion I feel to write. So, instead of doing the blog first thing before I write on the book, I started writing the book first. I did four pages, eight pages, twenty pages, thirty-one pages, nine pages. Merry 5 is over two hundred pages, and moving very nicely. Yea! I’m not a hundred percent certain that the blog is the problem. Maybe the book just needed to reach a certain point to take off. But the blog entries may be fewer and further between, and definitely the blogs will be at the end of the day and not the beginning. Book first, then blog. So now that all the explaining is over, on with the blog.
It’s Saturday, the weekend, but I got up determined to Do Things! Jon and I were going to do the big workout, because we missed it on Thursday. I was going to work, a little go keep the momentum going on the book. Homework for Trinity. And, if time, a movie. It turned out Trin finished her homework at Grandma Mary’s, except for reading. We finished breakfast, and I was ready to work. Jon and Trin wanted to watch the newest Mythbusters, where they revisit the Archimedes Death Ray. We’d Tivoed the show from Wednesday night. I said, “I’m not sure it’s a good use of time for us today.” Jon said, “It’s the weekend. The weekend isn’t about a good use of time.” Strangely, I couldn’t argue with him. We ended up sitting on the couch, all three of us, plus the four dogs, and watching Mythbusters. It was a big, warm, comforting pile of family and puppies. The show was fun, as always, and it was special time that we got to spend with our daughter. Somewhere while she was snuggled up against me, so happy, I realized that maybe, just maybe, Jon is right. Maybe the weekend isn’t about a good ‘use’ of time. Maybe it’s just about a good time. Having said that, Jon and I did exercise. So that was accomplished. But I have yet to work. Yeah, maybe I’ve earned a day off, but . . . I don’t do day’s off very well. It just seems to make me more tense later. So on one hand, it’s been a good day, and on the other hand, I’m all up tight about not working. I know from experience that sometimes even a day off without progress can impede the flow of a book. So, it’s not a fear without foundation. But I also know that it’s 6:00 on a Saturday night and my chances of working are nil and nothing. We’re prepping for dinner. Part of me is wondering if I’d feel better if I did steal away to my office for a few minutes. I finally realized that my writing is my time alone time, my me time. My work is stressful and deadlines are a bitch, but it is my alone time, and I value it. Other people watch soap operas, or collect stamps, or ski down mountains; I write. I finally realized that my job that started out as my hobby is still my hobby. Nice to know.