57

If writing was like baseball, and each writing session represented a hit, then I suppose you could say that yesterday, I bested Joe DiMaggio for the consecutive game hitting streak record. Joe is famous, in part, for having hit safely in 56 consecutive ball games back in 1941, a feat that no one has come close to duplicating. Yesterday, I wrote about 1,600 words, which is about twice my daily average. This morning, when I glanced at my daily almanac entry for yesterday, I saw that I have now written fiction for 57 consecutive days. I also passed the 50,000 word-mark during my writing yesterday.

It brings my 57-day total to 50,987 words. I’m averaging about 895 words per day. Sometimes  less, and other times, like yesterday, quite a bit more.

Unlike DiMaggio, I won’t be going into the Hall of Fame for this record, but each day now represents a new personal best, and on the days when I am utterly worn out and consider skipping writing that day, I find myself horrified at the thought that I might break the streak–and so I write. I guess my little record-keeping mechanism is really paying off.