Falling Behind

I have been falling behind on my writing here on the blog. In some ways, this is a good thing. There are only so many hours in a day, as much as I wish that weren’t true. The hour or so I spent writing posts and doing other tasks on the blog (responding to comments, etc.) is an hour that I am not spending time with the kids, or reading, or doing other kinds of writing.

I generally try to write two posts each day, storing one up for future use, and building a backlog to protect against those days where I don’t have the time or inclination to write. I had built up a backlog of just about 3 weeks worth of posts. As I write this one, my backlog is down to five days (six, if you count this one). Why have I fallen so far behind?

First, I’ve been busy with family-related events. Kelly was away for two weekends for different events and that meant I was home with all three kids the first weekend, taking them to their various activies, some of which overlapped, making for a busy afternoon.

Second, I have been reading more. I’d fallen something like 7 or 8 books behind the pace required to read 100 books this year. Recently, however, I’ve managed to close the gap, getting through 9 books in the first 16 days of May so far. Not all of these are short books, either. Today, for instance, I just finished reading The Age of Louis XIV by Will and Ariel Durant, the 8th book in their Story of Civilization series–and that tome weighs in at about 800 pages.

Third, I have started to write some fiction again, after a very long time away from that endeavor. I’m writing longhand, working in a Composition Book, and I’ve found the perfect time to get some writing in. I’m up each day around 5:30am or so. I’m usually out for my morning walk (about 2-1/2 miles) by 5:50am — I try to align my walks closely with sunrise — and I’m back at the house at 6:30am. Everyone is still asleep, and no one else gets up until 7am. That means I haev 30 minutes of silence in which to write. I’m writing longhand so I write more slowly than when I type, but I find I like writing at my desk in the morning before everyone is awake. It has been going well.

That morning time between 6:30 – 7:30am is when I was doing the bulk of my blog writing, and the fiction writing has clearly squeezed some of the blog writing out of that time block. I’m writing this post, for instance, at 6:30pm, while waiting for dinner to arrive.

I suppose that with all of the things I try to do, I will always be falling behind somewhere. I’ve come to accept that. I’ve been good about blog writing for a long time. Meanwhile, I fell behind in reading and fiction writing. Now I am catching up in those areas and have fallen behind here. Such is the day with a finite number of hours, minutes, and seconds.

All of this does mean that I’ll be cutting back here on the blog a bit–from posting every day to posting three days a week (Tuesday, Thursday, and Sunday) beginning tomorrow. On the plus side, I am just a few scenes short of completing the first short story I’ve written in more than five years.

Written on May 16, 23, 2022.