For once, it looks as if this will be a quiet weekend. It has been so long since I have been able to say that. James and I are going to try to slip down to the civic theater and watch Our Town. It should be great.

Of course, there will be the usual events. Grocery shopping. Church. Small group with the youth on Sunday nights. I really miss having them over for dinner beforehand, but I am trying to be relatively obedient. We never did get around to the Hobbit movie party. Perhaps we can do that later on. The students are such dears, even though some of them would claim to be otherwise. Oh well, I am grateful God has given me the time with them that He has.

I’ll also be working on stories of course. There is not a day yet when I haven’t written almost as far back as I can remember. Ray Bradbury’s advice, I think it was him, was particularly compelling in this. Some days the words do not come out as easily. Lately I have been going through a relative dry spell. I’ve only been writing between 5000 and 7000 words. And those have been hard words to reach.

I suspect it is just because I am healing. And that seems to do a number on the inspiration. Some have suggested that I should just take a break from writing. But I don’t want to. I am at a point now where to go without writing for more than a few hours is quite stressful. I don’t want to do anything to add to that, so instead I am just making sure that I don’t stress about how far I get. It is very enjoyable to write without the pleasure of deadlines.

One other thing that has occurred to me is the need to potentially put up a disclaimer on my blog. It shouldn’t be necessary, but you know, lawyer and the need for disclaimers. But there does seem to be done sort of miscommunication and even misunderstandings.

It is not my intention to deceive, but just so that my readers are on notice, I do not write about everything happening in my life. In general, I tend to focus on the positive and the interesting. Certain aspects of my life are not discussed and others are glossed over.

This isn’t because I am ashamed, but rather because I don’t want to talk about them. It is not deceitful to not mention that one of in relatively little pain for what one is usually in. Sometimes I just want to say that I am doing well without a lot of disclaimers.

Everything that is put out there is part of the story that we tell about our lives. Very few people decide to share everything. What is shared should be up to the individual except in a few situations. For some, that is fine. But for me, that just doesn’t work. Some parts of my story are such I only share it with those who are closest to me. Not because I am trying to pretend I have a perfect life, but because I just don’t want to talk about it or know that it’s for the best if I remain silent.

That’s also why I don’t talk about the law firm except in general terms.

Anyway, given some emails I have received (sorry that commenting isn’t working; I’m still working that out), it seemed that this clarification is necessary.

Returning to the weekend, I am so grateful for this relative calm. It doesn’t look like we’ll get much of the big snowfall, if any. Which is rather sad. I do love a good snow.  But even so, there will be hot cups of tea, good books, and time with family. So all in all, there’s much to be grateful for. 

Have you ever been running along and then suddenly faceplanted into freshly laid cement? While I’ve only faceplanted into slightly hardened cement (it was no less fun, let me tell you), I feel as if I’ve been metaphorically faceplanting for the past couple months.

I suppose that it’s just the way that things go. Technical errors caused a number of problems. The live Nanowrimo writing went fine so long as I didn’t try to put it up on the Internet. Currently, my Internet speed is so low that a five minute video takes almost a full day to upload. We’re trying to get that fixed. And the software I was using to record the writing process crashed my computer on November 30. I didn’t lose more than one chapter and one video, thankfully. Eventually I’ll get everything processed and uploaded, but for now, it’s fallen to a back burner.

Other writing goals and activities have not gone as planned. Formatting difficulties as well as disappointed expectations have been at play. And chronic illnesses love worsening at times like these. I recognize that many of these issues could be resolved by hiring people to do them, but that requires money or bartering. And I don’t have the funds for anything else, and I am fairly tapped on time as well.

So I have plugged along, doing the best I can. One of the more odd recent developments is that sleep is not restful, and the insomnia has worsened. For now, I’m trying to make the most of it. I spend a lot of time in prayer and meditation as well as plotting out different stories and working on projects. But I also know that this can’t continue like this.

Hopefully as several projects draw to a close, I’ll be able to rest again. In the meanwhile, I am still trying to take time to enjoy life. The time I have doesn’t change based on whether I enjoy it.

Now it may sound like this isn’t a good start to the new year, but…I still believe it will be a great one. Hard starts don’t mean hard roads all the way through. And perhaps this is necessary. I never really learned how to rest. I’ve always been so focused on my stories and other projects that I struggled to take time for myself or to relax. (In fact, I actually don’t know how to relax very well.) So perhaps the purpose of this is to teach me what that means. Eventually exhaustion will claim me, and then I will rest. (And if it doesn’t, I’ll be contacting some medical institutions to see if they’d like to conduct a few studies. Provided they fund my writing, of course. ;))

There’s lots of writing news on the horizon. I’m participating in more events and have many more stories about to be released. I’ve decided that 2016 is the year that I move through my backlist and see what is a good fit for traditional publishing and what is a good fit for indie. But more on that later. For now…blessings and joy to you all. Have a wonderful night, and may your sleep be sweet and restful.