Happy New Year

Thank you all for your concern, my mouth is much better.  I’m down to taking Advil only a couple of times a day.  It’s going to take awhile to heal completely but at least the pain isn’t going through my entire head now.  My focus is back.

So my new year has started.  I know the traditional beginning is January and has been since the 18th century for us English speakers, but for me it is September.  In fact, my year goes from September to June, July and August are formless blobs of time and don’t count.  September is the beginning of everything.

My family has something to do almost everyday of the week beyond school and work.  I’ve entered the “Mom’s Taxi” phase of motherhood and is it ever a pain.  I’m a hermit at heart and prefer to be at home, but duty calls.  Now I really have to be organized.

I picked up The Family Organizer at Wal-Mart and it has been pretty helpful.  I like the structure, it has the week’s menu on the same page as the week’s activities.  Makes meal planning so much easier.  I’ve also returned to grocery shopping with a list.  I can no longer meander down the aisles in a fog, I have to be focused.  Time is a valuable commodity and shopping with a list is so helpful.  Plus it saves money.  

Looking at my schedule and the things I have to do, I realize I have to start writing on a real schedule.  Not a nebulous goal-oriented schedule, but a solid time-in-the-chair schedule.  During the summer, having a 5 page goal was fine, but now, I don’t have the time control.  I need to fit the writing in at a certain time and make it a scheduled part of my day.  I have to do it with exercise as well.  Working out isn’t that tough for me to make time for.  The gym is on my way home from dropping the kids off at school, so the Thing and I can stop off for an hour on the way home.  But writing is a different story.  The creative genius fluctuates.  Sometimes I feel authorly at 10 a.m., other times, at 10 p.m.  But such frivolities aren’t going to work.  I firmly believe we can train ourselves to fit what has to be done, whether we like it or not.  It isn’t going to be easy, but it can be done.  And maybe that is the secret to being a successful author.  I think if I can make myself write at a scheduled time.  Writing is really my last frontier with regards to discipline.

What do you struggle with?  Doesn’t have to be writing, but is there something in your life you have had to force yourself to do?  Or find creative ways of fitting into your life?