March 2017: Marching forward bit by bit

Here’s what March 2017 looked like in writing…

Total Words Written This Month
50,869 words

Average Words Per Day
1,641 words

Monthly Goal
I didn’t set a goal since this was my first full month with the new baby and setting a goal seemed idiotic.

Yearly Goal
183,609/200,000 words (92%)

Things completed:

• Nothing. Nada. Zip. And I’m fine with that.

Other Works Actively in Progress this Month:

• 4th Orange
• my adaptation of Pintosmalto 
• both personal and writing journaling

Overall

I wasn’t sure what to expect from March, writing wise. I had a brand new baby so I was keeping my expectations very low… but, at the same time, my husband was home for the first two weeks because of parental leave so surely I would get some time, right?

There was also a balancing act to refine. Because, while I was going into this baby year promising myself I’d stop and smell the rosy cheeks, my career is also in a very different place than it was when I had my last baby in 2012. Back then, if I took an entire year off, no one would have really cared. But this year I have deadlines and works in progress and career momentum. So while I wanted to take this year mostly easy, I can’t take it off completely.

As is the theme around here, I felt like I got nothing done this month, certainly far less than I thought I’d get down with my husband home. But, looking at the numbers, I still passed 50,000 words which is just about my monthly average anyway pre-baby so not too shabby. (It’s also my second highest March ever, hilariously enough!)

I did a lot of revision work on 4th Orange, totally rewriting the middle, scrapping it, writing a another new middle, and then tackling the ending… and then repeating that process. (And, writing this in April, I’m still rewriting the whole thing again. It’s unending. I just cannot get this play right!) I dare not give you a release date fro this play as it feels like it comes together and falls apart on a daily basis.

Beyond 4th Orange, I did a ton of journaling. I have two journals now. The first is the usual personal journal that is mostly feelings and funny things my kids do. The second is a new writing journal where I talk projects and process out with myself. I started it in the hopes I could use it to tame the disaster of notes I end up putting into Scrivener for each project. I really like keeping it so far, though it’s too early to say how much good it’s doing overall. (I’m writing the first draft of this blog post in my journal instead of directly into WordPress like I used to for whatever that’s worth.)

Up Next

More journaling! I use my personal journal like a baby book and to capture all these little memories of the wee ones so I want to make sure I keep updating it regularly throughout baby’s first year. It’s also easier writing than something like fiction editing so it’s a good way to keep the pen moving on days when I’m too tired or just don’t have enough brain power to do much of anything else.

I’ve also been using the aforementioned writing journal to work on some lingering plot issues in my adaptation of Pintosmalto which I plan to work on next. I’m leaning towards writing a full length version of that play which I will then also cut down into a one-act version that will replace one of the plays that’s in the full length version of 4th Orange now. That said, there are still many plot holes in that play that need plugging so I’m not ready to start rewriting it quite yet.

Speaking of plugging, that’s really all I’ll be doing in the near future. Plugging away, trying to balance everything, enjoy every minute and still get at least something done. We’ll see how it goes!

(Adding a sentence here literally just because this blog post was 666 words long and… yeah.)