It's October 1st – I Should Blog

Fall is in the air, as the saying goes, and this is my favorite time of year. There's something about the transition in Autumn that appeals to me more than the transition in Spring. Since I tend to like colder temperatures more than hotter temperatures, perhaps it's the anticipation of those cooler temperatures and actually feeling a little bit of it.

Why, you ask, if I like colder temperatures, did I sojourn in the Arabian deserts for five years, and now lived twenty-four years in the South? In truth I've found I can be happy in all temperatures, though I have my favorites.

Today has been a good day. Over the last several days at home I drafted an article for Suite101.com, on construction dispute mediation. In mediation on Monday; article written by Friday. Art imitates life, I guess you could say.

On The Writers' View 2, a Yahoo e-mail loop I'm on, the current discussion is on excuses to doing what needs to be done in order to succeed as a writer. The answers are fear (both of failure and success), busyness, lack of skill, lack of industry contacts, etc., etc. Lots of excuses, none of them that should be made. The discussion leader had some poignant words for us, the great unpublished masses of writers: butt in chair, fingers on keyboard. And, on occasion, eyes in book.
So I have no excuses. I just need to get at it harder and get it done. Write articles. Work on my novel. Capture ideas in a retrievable way. Update my submissions log. Research the market. Submit some poems and short stories to literary magazines. Work on my Bible studies, especially the new one in research. Read to improve craft. Read to be inspired. Hobnob with writers (probably less than I've been doing on-line, more IRL). Get my weight down and my body better in tone. Finish the downstairs bathroom. Finish preparations for the new downstairs carpet. Trade some stocks.

The first of the month is always an occasion to begin anew, not quite as much as the first of the year, but still a time to focus on doing things better, smarter. One thing I've done better and smarter, at least I think so, is to finally come up with a writers diary of sorts.

I've tried journaling, and usually do that in fits and starts. I've tried weekly log sheets, with a little success, but usually set it aside after a while. In July I developed a monthly writing log. It's just a table, 32 columns across and about 20 rows down, with lots of white space at the bottom. I use a row to identify a writing task (which will include whatever reading I'm doing), and check the day I worked on that task. I use footnotes when necessary to explain exactly what it was I did concerning that task. I've used this log for three months now, and like it. Here's to many more months of documenting my progress.

And here's to a good October, enjoyable in season, fruitful in tasks completed, abundant in words assembled into sentences, paragraphs, lines, chapters, and sections. May computers work, the Internet remain stable, modems and routers not fail, the electricity not hiccup, and all things writing-related work in harmony.