New Life Ahead

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Well, in true 2020 style, I’m off on a new adventure. I’m on sabbatical from the indie bookstore I’ve worked at for a decade. The turn of the year will mark the end of my time with them. Time for a change. I’m excited about the possibilities. And it is refreshing to have time to read again. This year that’s been hard to come by – I worked 61 days in a row during the lockdown, so I’m taking the time now to stop and look around, to gather myself and my resources and get ready to move onto to something new and exciting.

Photo by Tim Gouw on Pexels.com

Day to Day

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Welcome to my corner of the world, in all its glory/inglory. This is where I work, every day, right now. This is my social distancing. It’s an odd space, reworked to be a hangout spot, but now where the Pete the Cat lives and where I work from home for the bookstore I’m employed with, at least right now. I don’t know how long it will last, given everything, but I’m trying to help limp things along. I love the light in this room.

The somewhat former teen hangout I call my office right now.

Such a Mess

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At this point I’m wed to finishing this novel, but I’m worried it’s gonna take years.  I’ve been working on it for years, off and on, and the tangled narrative clearly demonstrates this.  I’m trying to be patient with myself, non-judgemental, but I am honestly intimidated.  This thing is a mess.  There’s uneven voice, pacing, inconsistencies borne of it’s prolonged creation.  I don’t know where everyone is, and at this point, I need to know where they are, even if they are off-screen.  I started this adventure pantsing it, and now I’ve got a lot of loose threads to either cut loose, or incorporate into the weave at the end of the story.  It’s probably going to take months just to get caught up in Aeon Timeline.  Then the fun part – working on the notebook full of fixes and to do’s I’ve begun.

Time

Time.  There isn’t any.  Or rather, there’s not enough.  I’ve been working retail for years, now, and while it’s a good job at an indie bookstore, it’s hella hard work and tiring.  And I’m a single mom, “unevenly yoked” (his ironic words) to an ex who doesn’t step it up and do his part.  So I’m worn out.  The middle of my life snuck up on me and now I have to fight for breathing room.  There’s time to rest, but not enough time to rest, get all my required BS done, and write/create as I’d like.  Imma get there, but damn – the work I still have to do on my in-progress novel is staggering.

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Working on a Timeline

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Literally.

A couple of years ago I used my NaNoWriMo coupon to bag on to a copy of Aeon Timeline 2 I’ve fiddled with it before, but I’ve just recently realized it may be the tool I need to pick up the narrative thread of the story. I’m a single mom, and there are many moments I just can’t keep up with daily writing. Some days, I’m just happy to be able to get up and go to work and get my bills paid. A few weeks ago, when I got up the gumption to take another look at it, I found I’d both lost my place and had a billion threads to tie up, give or take a million or two.  So I opened a fresh timeline and got to work.

It’s excruciating and unbearable in someways – lots of scenes to track, and I’m doing my absolute damnedest to not look at the quality of words in this still unpolished draft.  On the other hand, wow, what a thing I will have when I am done!  You might check out the program if you get a chance.  Some aspects of it are pretty intuitive, but to be frank, you may end up hitting the help documents and even YouTube to understand it’s finer points – it can be a bit fiddly.

Getting Started

So I’ve had this domain for about 8 months, and I’ve done absolutely nothing with it, except change the theme about a million times. True – real life has been heavy, taking up a huge amount of space in my concentration and “spare time.” But I refuse to quit moving, and will keep trying to make this space for myself. So, here’s my obligatory beginning post, full of uninteresting cheesiness. Watch this space.

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