My family is on holidays, right now. Which means the kids roll out of bed at around 9:30, and tap on the bedroom door to ask for breakfast near 10. My husband shuffles out to arrange cereal and granola bars, pour some glasses of juice, and then shuffles back to bed for an hour or so. Sometimes I get up then, too. Usually I don’t. From September onward, I average about five hours of sleep per night, so I make up for lost time, when I can. And my kids are pretty clear on rules and consequences, so while I have woken up to Lego mine-fields and Playmobil explosions, Treehouse TV turned up past nosebleed, and Fruit Loop trails à la Hansel & Gretel; they haven’t toilet-papered my house, painted my walls, dug warrens into the potted plants, broken out the nail polish, or tried to “cook” anything more complicated than bread-and-honey. (All things I totally would have done if my Mum ever tried to sleep in.) They’re really proud of themselves, when I come out and tell them I had the best sleep ever. (Thanks for playing so quietly, guys!) Sometimes, though, when we’re cleaning up together, still in our jammies, my hair squished flat on one side and pointy on the other, my eyes gummy and torpid behind thiourethane lenses, my kids wake me up all the same:
Yesterday, I said, “Danica, where’s the box for these? Did you leave it in your room?”
“Uh, my brother has it. No, it’s beside your computer. Look!”
“Got it.” I said, undertaking the re-packaging of hexagonal colouring sticks with fumbling, de-caffeinated precision.
“Are you going to use your computer today?”
“Probably. I use it to check the weather and see what my friends are up to. Maybe see if the rinks are open to go skating?”
“Well, duh.” She stacked up some books to return to her bedroom. “You don’t have any school work, though, right? So, how come you’re not working on your story anymore? You didn’t finish it, did you?”
“Not yet, no.”
“You should finish it. You always tell me to finish things.”
“That’s true.”
“‘Cause you won’t have very much time when school starts again.”
“I know.”
“And then you’ll be sad, if it’s not done.”
“Can we finish cleaning up now, please?”
I looked at the Fiction Project file this morning, and the date modified is November 26, which means I haven’t worked at it in over a month. I started dreaming about it again, last week. I’ll be sitting at the table and find myself staring into space, where different pieces of the story work together and come apart, and my husband makes jokes about watching the words scroll through my eyeballs…. I’d originally planned to have a draft of Part I ready by New Year’s, so I could then beg one of you guys to pretty-please give it a read and a rough edit and tell me which parts suck….
Yeah.
Danica’s re-building a Lego firetruck while Shelton makes a golf-cart out of K’nex. We’ll have some lunch and go toboganning in a little while, and then I’ve got some teaching to do. The playroom needs reorganizing, and the kids need more shelving in their bedrooms. I did my year-end banking, but haven’t even looked at my filing, and there is still a mountain of recycling bags and boxes in the front room. Beside the tree that needs de-decorating, along with the window films, and the paper snow flakes, and the festive preschool art. Nevermind the shirts that don’t fit, the bottle-depot returns, and the bags for clothing-recycling, Eco-Station, and Goodwill….
A thousand words. Before bedtime, tonight.
I promise.
Well, I am so impressed that you can write in that kind of chaos. I find it hard to make a blog post … facebook is about all I can manage right now. :D
I haven’t written since January 7th, Shonnie! I’m happy with the work I got done up to the end of winter break, but I am drowning in the chaos, these days. Raining and pouring, as they say… :P
haha … I can understand that feeling. :D
Well, okay. Do your thousand words. But only if you want to. Cause if the book becomes another must-do-deadlined thing, it’s kind of defeated its purpose, no? Writers need holidays, too. Of course, if writing *is* the holiday, that’s different. (Laundry? Recycling? Ah, they can wait. And there’s a venerable European tradition to leave Christmas trees up til at least January 6th.)
Am I sensing some post-NaNoWriMo disillusionment, A? (I kid! I kid!) I did my thousand words, yesterday, and another thousand words this morning. It was kind of like a little holiday, to finish the picture of the contract-killer-as-family-man I’ve been sketching away at since early fall. AND I managed to learn quite a lot about boats-in-bottles at the same time! My crew is back on Wednesday, and the littlest of them would climb the tree and eat the decorations, so I best have it all squared away before then. You’re right, though: I’ve still got some time :-)
Ah yes. The imminent invasion of tree-eating hordes does put the tree removal somewhat higher on the priority list.
And no, no post-Nano disillusionment here – the opposite, in fact: I’ve been working on the missing chapters these last few days, and am thoroughly enjoying having a non-deadlined writing experience – it’s quite different from the “must get done” feeling that Nano engenders (and which is all to the good, but only during November).
Contract killers in bottles of family men? Oyoyoy… :)
Don’t worry. I won’t make you read it. Though my bad guys are usually really nice people, with one or two significant flaws…. Maybe he’ll send his bottles/souvenirs to a community centre or something, when he’s, you know, done with them. *maniacal laugh*
I start and trail off, forget (on purpose, sometimes) and come back to it. I could use a Danica kick in the pants to get writing!
Hmmm…. Well, she does have an iPod now, which means she can’t hear or see me for hours at a time. If I were to ship her to you by FedEx, her playlist would probably end around the time she reached your place, and I can almost guarantee she would kick you as soon as you opened her crate…. ;-) All things considered, it’s probably safer for you to just sit down and write, though. She’s been practicing kung fu at weekends since the start of fall term. She kicks REALLY hard!
How universal is this story among women writers and artists? Inspired by your tale, I just reblogged a pervious story I’d posted last year at http://vpascoefiction.blogspot.com/2012/12/holiday-refrain.html
I think it’s pretty universal. I’ve talked to many women who’ve had projects on the go for years, but feel guilty about giving it priority over other obligations. Even with brilliant kids and supportive husbands, there are still only twenty-four hours in a day.
Sounds too familiar. I have to work up my courage sometimes to look at that “date modified” date! Just keep swimming :-)
Hooray for Dory! These days, writing is more like skating, for me: Starting and stopping are proving very difficult, but the part in between is so much fun!
That’s crap. By my carefully calculated analysis your total hours of sleep has to be in the minuses. I really don’t know how you do it. But you do it, an your doing it right,. An the Valentine4 is a fully functional supportive family unit to boot.
What with thinking and staring off into space I have little time to do proper shtufffs.
Hahaha! Thanks, Hudson! Sometimes the proper shtuffs gets put off for a loooong time around, here. Like laundry, for instance. My kids have also gotten very good at telling me they’re down to one pair of pants each and/or that they have no choice but to raid my sock drawer…. *sigh*
Let it flow, let it flow, let it flow ♪♫♫♪
Oh, the weather outside is frightful, but the story will be delightful…. =D
GREAT post and your’e a terrific writer. I empathize all the way as a writer, though my kids are a bit older maybe, 7 and 9 but that doesn’t mean their crap isn’t everywhere. And now a new pup that honestly like another toddler… would love to have you join some other struggling writers who are also looking for feedback in my writing work shop FB group : https://www.facebook.com/groups/Sandraswritingworkshop/
Thanks, Sandra! Yes, my kids are 6 and 4 and gloriously messy. I keep hoping (in vain, probably) that in a year or so they won’t want to have so much stuff :P I’ll check out your writing group, too. Thanks for the invite :-)