August 2, 2009
As I’ve mentioned before, I tend to spend every available extra moment of my life on moving my fiction writing career forward. I think it’s the only way to make progress, to keep hammering away minute by minute, day after day. However, this leads me to neglect other aspects of my life. For example, I don’t read enough; though reading is important to my writing, it almost always loses out to actual writing. Work around the house tends to suffer, as well; for example, I haven’t washed our cars in months (though I’ve never been that consistent at washing cars, really). And financial aspects of my life, as critical as they might be, almost always take a back seat to writing. Bills and paperwork pile up…which is why I sometimes need to take a day like today and catch up on dealing with them.
That’s one of the main things I did today, in addition to going to church, going to lunch, grocery shopping, calling my contractor (we have a fresh leak in the roof!), and spending quality time with my wife. I spent several hours organizing receipts, recording expenses in spreadsheets, filing bills, and processing long-delayed paperwork. Not exactly my favorite way to spend time in my home office, but sometimes, I just can’t put it off any longer. I’m not done yet, unfortunately; still lots of piles of paperwork cluttering the office. But at least I made a dent in it. And once I get it all cleared away, or mostly cleared away, I can dive headlong into my next big writing task…a short story this week, most likely, followed by the long-awaited next novel next week, after the upcoming very busy weekend with company from out of town and a big birthday party at our house. So that’s a good thing.
How about another travel photo? Here’s one from Wildwood, New Jersey, in July 1983. Sigh. I miss my hair! See you soon!
Wildwood, New Jersey - July 1983
