Slowly But Surely...

Hello, Blog, how I've missed you!

I created a double-edged sword by making a commitment to myself that I would only blog when I worked on my manuscript that day. The concept? Theoretically, to offer myself incentive to write (or lately, revise) each day. The reality? When I don't write, I don't blog, and the longer I don't blog the more guilty I feel because it represents how long I haven't worked on my novel, either...and it's DATED. I can now see that although I last blogged on Halloween, I hadn't actually worked on my revision since Oct. 15th. That's basically five weeks (not to be confused with that movie with the Moores, Mary Tyler and Dudley, Six Weeks) of not writing. And by not writing all that time, especially with the encouragement and feedback I've gotten lately, I feel like I'm letting a lot of people down. Myself, first of all. Mr. GJ, who's endured the years of my "working on a book." The people who have given me great feedback and who are rooting for me (many I don't even know that well!). My mother, who was my biggest cheerleader, and who although she's not here anymore to see me get published one day, I feel like I'm letting down the most because she encouraged me for so long.

So, although we have to get the house prepared for Thanksgiving next week (yes, I'm cooking for my in-laws, but it'll be very casual), although the weeds around our newly-planted CA natives are calling to me every time I walk out the front door, although I just want to curl up on the couch and plow through all the books that are sitting on my bookshelf as yet unread, I ignored all those options and sat down today to...WRITE! Okay, so it was only a quarter of a page, but it completed a page I'd been stuck on lo these many weeks, and after I finished it I felt like I finally leapt over a giant mudpuddle I'd been standing in front of. The longer I stood in front of it, the more I convinced myself that I couldn't get over it, but without thinking about it any more, I just jumped up and got over it. I'm antsy at the computer today, so I think I will go do some weeding now, but I really hope that when I come back to my story on Monday it'll be just a little bit easier--and a little less daunting.