Better Days Are Coming

I mentioned the email yesterday about what procrastination is really saying. It's your body's response to fear while sitting at the keyboard. I asked myself, "What am I afraid of?" and tried to answer some of it. I'm thinking right now, that would be a better Miss Story. But, not right now. Maybe I'll explore it with Amy in the sequel to Outside of Time. Not today or maybe. She did conquer fear in the ending of Outside of Time.

Last evening on another wonderful summer day when I think of camp, fires, tents and bugs, I read The Chunky Method Handbook. I sat outside until the lightning bugs lighted the ground and the sky was a fading pink from brilliant vermillion. I laid in my lounge chair and wanted to fall asleep. Weather forecast warned me not to, as storms were expected at midnight. I'm not sure I can convey how content I was.

I won't give away much of the Chunky Method. The gist was find your writing word count until the creativity tires. Do this for five days with a program that counts your words. Allie Pleiter, the author, touched on the history of book writing from the nineties on. Publishers looked at page count, now with so many different programs, the golden rule is word count.

My own trial of writing for Ghost for the fourteen days did this. I didn't keep a physical tracking of it, but I'd say the average was one thousand words. I also wrote in other venues, as I mentioned. So, if I sit myself down, I can write those words and calculate how long a novel would take, by saying often I would write my "chunk."

This handbook was published in 2015 and I sensed subtle changes in the ten years and some glaring changes in my own life. Occasionally on Facebook, ten years ago, I posted my word count on novels I was writing for the day and my progress with other writing projects, as well as working full time. I worked afternoon turn in a Long Term Care Facility, that did not require bringing work home. In home health, I often finished up charting and the busy work expected, at home, so writing did take a back seat more often than I wanted to let it. I joked that home health was my best paid writing gig. Yet, I was sad at my limitations.

I went through a time, I created a goal to write twenty minutes a day. If I could do twenty, I may do more if the writing flowed. Writing goals- word count or set time-challenged me. Often I failed the test. I hope to be more determined as I'm getting used to my MacBook Air. Still haven't seen the Word program I paid for and downloaded. In its time, right?

I read the follow up of the email from yesterday. I sometimes get the feeling, they have spied on my life. Sermons used to that, too. All the excuses and feelings for not writing, he seemed to fill out.

I haven't read an email, yet, but the title was being more than your excuses or something like that. (https://www.withallen.com/blog/apologize-less-create-more?ss_source=sscampaigns&ss_campaign_id=685098f9cfb4827744462f4c&ss_email_id=68839bfb3167e31178f69525&ss_campaign_name=Apologize+Less%2C+Create+More+-+Allen’s+Message+in+a+Bottle&ss_campaign_sent_date=2025-07-25T15%3A00%3A28Z) Sometimes, I feel when I sit down to write, all I can think to put on the page is excuses. I pray to overcome that form of writing. Novel writing needs to commence, too. I lay awake praying for how my story should unfold. I hope my praying friends lift my writing up as well. Some of you reading this may really say, "Good Lord, this girl needs help."

Back to the follow up email about procrastination. I still always think of a story read to us in third grade about adventures of a family on the road told by the father and he kept saying, "We'll get back to that story about that swamp land in Florida," or something like that. Funny how only the essence of a story, the humor sticks with a person for years. Talking fifty five years, maybe more, but I'll get back to that.

The author of the email wrote, basically, you're not a bad person, you're not a bad writer. It's like telling someone to play the piano but have no teacher, or play a sport with no team or coach. Yet, writers go it alone. He mentioned many ways to get motivated that often fall flat. Like going on retreats, conferences, money wasted on conferences, webinars, software to make that writing flow. Some of his software programs, he never even opened. We don't want to think how much money has been spent.

His solution is some kind of group. Not a writing critique group, but fellowship of writers. One more email till the hook. Maybe.

I had tried before to find a group. In person, then it dissolves because the coffee shop closed- just came up in my memories on Facebook. Often the distance to travel deters me. The times of a group I see are in the mornings or evenings when I worked. It depends on the year I was seeking. I'm going to try it one more time, the in person group, at least with one writer locally. She missed her evenings with a group that met her needs. It's the nitty gritty of business building that published writing has become I want to know more about and get help in. I wrote about the old way before, in the old movies, like I Remember Momma, Greer Garson looking at the camera after finishing "The End," and then the story of the family is shown. Just sit in a nice quiet spot of your attic and write the novel that becomes a movie. Yeah, not so much anymore.

Allie Pleiter addressed this form of writing. She used Marlan and Dorey from Finding Nemo as types of writers. Focused or scattered. The cabin in the woods with no distractions. Yet, I also write on my phone, before it was possessed and not carry a notebook. I think I fall somewhere in-between. And I decided yesterday as well as for some time, "Just keep writing, writing, writing." I need to write. Or as my husband and I remembered yesterday in Warren, Ohio, Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes opened a concert at River Rock Amp with Better Days are Coming. I joked, "Maybe he drove through this neighborhood." But that's a story for another day.