Earlier this week, we began construction on an addition to our house. Short term, it means a new office for me, and a sunroom and deck for the family. Middle-to-long term, it will help with resale when the time comes to move my little band of mischief-makers.
There are a lot of unknowns, unexpecteds, and uncontrollables.
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Wistfulness alert: This past week marked ten years that we’ve lived in this house.
It is the longest I’ve lived in any one place.
We had celebrations and memorials, holidays and illness. We’ve welcomed our third child, said goodbye to our beloved first dog and hello to our goofball second dog.
We’ve changed careers. We’ve struggled and we’ve prospered. We’ve suffered and we’ve triumphed. It’s been the home of my midlife.
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Hello, it’s still 2020.
I’ll spare you the ubiquitous “January 2020 was the longest decade of my life” jokes and raise a glass to everyone in solidarity.
Starting rewrites and edits from the beginning is some kind of hilarious because my beginning , a fairly important part of a book to get right, is my biggest mess. I can’t get it to hold up to its importance, so my plan is to revisit it weekly and rewrite it as a “break” between other scenes and chapters. Once I get the beginning good (enough) the rest will flow so much easier, but it’s like strength training. I have to build it up over time and allow my brain muscles and whatever else is up there to rest.
This meant, as it usually does, that the writing suffered and my schedule, which involved getting the first act of my book fully edited by mid-February, was too optimistic. By the third day of January, I was already somehow a week behind, which, while exciting that I somehow have that kind of power over time and space, I can never seem to get that to work to my advantage.
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Jackie Pick 