So, Kim, how have those summer survival strategies been working out?

By Kim


While I consider my two young daughters to be the most precious people in the world, school vacations are trying times in the Bullock household. Sasha and Ashlyn ‘try’ to get equal billing in Mommy’s day. I ‘try’ to comply and yet still get some writing done.

At the beginning of the summer I made up a list of strategies I intended to follow this vacation in order to keep everyone sane. I thought you might enjoy knowing how that’s working out for me.

I will accept the fact that it will be impossible to write every day and that some days I shouldn’t even try. Accepting I couldn't write every day was easy, but I’ve yet to experience that day I SHOULD try since May 24th.

I will involve my four-year-old in chores. This idea led to a fairly detailed allowance plan for both children. The good news: my house is far neater than it was a couple of weeks ago. The bad news: the only words written last week were ‘the plan.’

I will bribe my eight-year-old to entertain her sister. That’s how I’m writing this post on Sunday afternoon.

I will relax and enjoy our family vacation to Italy this summer. As you can tell from my last post, I excelled at this one. Unfortunately, now I can’t look out my window without wishing the view looked more Tuscan than Texan.

On those days that I can’t work, I’ll do things from which I can be painlessly interrupted. I meant things like transcribing old letters, updating my website, even painting. I’ve accomplished laundry. Does that count?

I will not feel guilty for putting one child in day camp and the other in summer school for part of the vacation. I’ve only succeeded in having both children out of the house for five days since May, so I haven’t had the opportunity to feel guilt. Two of those days were spent frantically packing for four people since my husband was unexpectedly on a business trip until the day before we left for Italy. Ashlyn’s first week back at school was supposed to be this past week. Monday at 11:00 AM I got a call saying she had thrown up and I needed to come get her. She was perfectly healthy and active the rest of the day. I got another call on Thursday for the same reason, and again she was fine. (The doctor says she's fine, too.)

I’m beginning to wonder if I'm ever supposed to write again.

I hope that by finishing this post today I can open my work-in-progress Monday morning, read over my last chapter to remember what Carl and Madonna Ahrens were up to when I last communed with them and (gasp) write something new…

What about you? Did you go into the summer with the best intentions only to accomplish very little or have you been able to keep with a schedule? If you are in the latter group, I'm envious. Please share your secret for success.

Photos by Deborah Downes. For my Roycroft readers, the photo of my children was taken on Via Appia Antica in Rome, a.k.a. the original Appian Way.

Going to Italy is Like Having a Love Affair – Without the Guilt

By Kim

As some of you know, I returned from a family vacation in Italy less than two days ago. If this post meanders a bit more than usual, it is because my jet-lagged body still insists it’s bedtime though it’s only mid-afternoon.

It will likely take me months to fully absorb all that I’ve seen and done since June 19^th. Being in Italy was, for me, like throwing myself into the arms of a new and particularly fervent lover. With the exception of one awful pizza in Siena, when this suitor placed a meal before me, it was meant to feed my soul not just my body. The wine, while never indulged in to the point of drunkenness, left me warm, satiated, and grinning like a Cheshire cat. Even the air was seductive – often infused with the scent of jasmine. Around every bend in the narrow winding roads was something unexpected: a Roman ruin, an Etruscan tomb, an ancient and gnarled olive tree, a castle, a village perched precariously upon a cliff, a Tuscan valley so dramatic and beautiful I could do nothing but stare and weep. I have no doubt that heaven looks like Tuscany.

As a writer of historical fiction, this sensory overload included a whole other dimension lost on the rest of my family. I would look at a medieval street and marvel at how similar it all would have looked a thousand years ago. My daughters laughed at me because I could not stop touching stone walls and dipping my hand into every fountain. I noticed by the end, though, that Sasha began picking up stones from places that obviously moved her. I’m sure her future husband will be as baffled by that habit as mine is.

I brought my laptop with me but never opened it. In fact, I didn’t give my WIP a single passing thought. Despite having a torn ligament in my foot, I climbed the bell tower in Siena, explored the ruins of Hadrian’s villa and the catacombs, ate wild boar, navigated Rome by train, subway, car, streetcar and city bus, indulged in a daily gelato, toured the castle where Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes got married, had an audience with the Pope, swam in the Mediterranean, and watched as my children made friends with a little girl who spoke no English. Watching Sasha and Ashlyn thrive on the freedom of being in a country where children are adored and fretted over was the most rewarding part of the whole adventure. They didn’t particularly want to come home.

Now that I am back in Dallas, refreshed, and will soon have both children in summer activities, I’m ready to dive back into my WIP. I have the feeling that my progress will be greatly enhanced by having left both my comfort zone and my muses behind for a little while. What about you? Have any of you had a big boost of creativity after going on a grand adventure?

All but one photo in this post were taken by Sasha Bullock, my nine-year-old, who was presented with her first digital camera upon arrival in Rome and quickly developed a love of photography.