Is my word count showing?

By Pamela

You know you should exercise daily—bathe, too. You should write thank you notes within a week of receiving a gift. You should rinse the plate before you put it in the dishwasher and separate reds from whites when doing laundry.

People notice when you don’t do these things.

People may not notice when you don’t write on your work-in-progress.

But, my people do.

Recently I’ve been reading the manuscripts of my fellow WhatWomenWriters. Julie and Joan just completed theirs and are gearing up for querying. Susan finished hers, too, and is about to send it to us—letting her family take the first pass—although I managed to wrangle an early draft from her. Kim is steadily plodding forward with her labor of love, and I get to see chapters as she goes.

Julie emailed me the other day: How is your manuscript coming along? Joan sent me a note: Feel free to send me some chapters. Susan said over lunch: So when was the last time you worked on your story?

Oh, I had excuses. Busy with work. Kids’ end-of-school-year activities. Mom here for a long visit. Finally, two Saturdays ago, Joan and I met for breakfast. I knew my explanations wouldn’t hold water with her. Joan knows my writing better than anyone; we co-wrote a manuscript together.

We talked about whether or not I still loved the story. I did. Or whether another story line was tugging at my heart. Not yet. “I just put everything else first,” I confessed.

That’s when this dear friend, who has a full-time job, a son who just graduated high school and a recently completed manuscript, told me her secret. “I got up an hour early every morning and wrote before I had to go to work,” Joan said. “Pick a time, every day, maybe from 10 to noon, and write it.”

And so I have. Not every day yet, but almost. I just passed the 30,000-word mark, so there’s no turning back. In fact, I got up the courage to send Joan two versions of one chapter I recently completed, as I am torn as to which version is more compelling. She wrote back: So glad you’ve picked this back up.

I’m so glad my people notice when I don't.

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.