Whatcha Up To?:

This summer has not followed the rules:

• My trailer-office is nowhere near ready, the unexpected findings taking much longer to correct than expected.
• My afternoons of writing time have been nonexistent due to so many projects around the property requiring my husbands knowledgable hand and my watching of the children so he can do them.
• We’ve had an unbelievable number of medical issues arise that have made everything unexpectedly complicated.

And none of this is meant as complaint or excuse. It simply is.

Life is naturally full of furious activity and lulls. I am attempting, daily and often times multiple times a day, to remind myself that this is simply a lull in my creative time. There is furious activity everywhere else, and so, a lull in creativity is required. I am still writing essays in my mind and occasionally stealing a moment to write bits of them down. One such moment of stolen time led to a mostly finished essay, and that essay has been picked up for publication with the completion of a few edits, the last one of which has been submitted and will hopefully now be accepted.

Things are happening against all odds, and this one acceptance could prove to be a major step. I’d be joining a publication that has published Roxane Gay, one of my literary heroines. So it’s no small feat.

Still, I try not to count my chickens before they’re hatched. I try to remember it’s just one publication, I try to remind myself this work, this job of creating and delivering to the world, is fraught with gatekeepers and demands ones best. Always.

I try to remind myself there have been no official acceptances since May, and this is due entirely to my schedule: my refusal to rise before 7am, my inability to garner enough restorative sleep to function on four hours of sleep as I’ve always done, my acceptance that afternoon writing time is on hiatus until the office is complete.

I content myself with getting the boys ready for another year of homeschool, with assisting them in finishing out the 4-H year which culminates in the County Fair at the end of this month, with organizing and reorganizing our home spaces to make them comfortable, accessible, constructive.

It is the fallow times, the lull times, that allow for a bursting and hyperactively productive time when the time allows. And I will content myself with this knowledge, with trusting in the ebb and flow, with putting faith in my tenacity and determination and the timing of all things being outside my control at the moment. I breathe. I will breathe. I force myself to breathe.

As always, thank you for being here. I hope you enjoy the monthly writing prompts, the monthly rejections, the publications in the Sanders County Ledger, and the videos (when I have the silence required to record them).

I hope you enjoy your summer as it comes to a close. I hope you have grand plans for the cooler months of fall and the excitement of Halloween and the tumble into family holidays that follow it.

Thank you for being here.

August Timed Writing Prompt Available Now!

Want a chance to have your work featured on my website, social media, Patreon and Substack accounts? Send me your unedited, timed writing response for your chance to be featured! Find the latest prompt on Patreon or Substack.

Monthly Book Talks!

Love to read but never know what to pick up? Check out my monthly videos for my local Thompson Falls Public Library here. Remember to Subscribe for free so you never miss one. Book talks: like book club, but shorter.

Readings

Did you know I occasionally remember to record readings of my published pieces. You can check out the latest one here. Be sure to Subscribe so you don’t miss the next one!

Please forward this to those you think may enjoy it. As always, thanks for joining me. I appreciate you’re here.

NOTE: You can email me directly at sunday (at) sundaydutro (dot) com