TIME TO WRITE

In Conversations with God by Neale Donald Walsch, God says that there’s enough time. It’s easy for him to say. He should tell that to a mother with five children trying to get her children ready for school. Or tell it to a woman with a full-time job in the home and outside the home with children. What’s the old saying, a woman’s work is never done.

Imagine most of our mothers only worked in the home.

Time seems so fragile when your best friend dies or for that matter when any loved one dies. Could it be ‘cause humans know that there are two sides do life—birth and death? In an earlier post, I mention the movie, The Blade Runner. (http://headwaterswritersguild.blogspot.com/search?q=blade+runner ) The robots are searching for their maker in order to obtain their expiry dates.

As we age, aren’t we always wondering about our own expiry date? While going through the grieving process when my best friend Colette died, I thought about the meaning of life and then I focused on the meaning of my life.

I believe when loved ones die that they gift us a gift? I constantly wondered what gift did she give me? Finally, I realized she gave me the gift of time. Don’t waste time because you don’t know when you’ll be called home.

Since she died, I revaluate my life but especially time. The worst addiction I have is checking email. Do I have to check it every two minutes? I spend very little time watching TV. I usually disconnect the satellite in May and start it back up in September.

I make almost every decision based on time. Will this give me more time to write? If I organize the Open Mic will it be a benefit to my writing?

I spend my precious time with close friends and family. And of course I spend every second I can with my granddaughter because I know how quickly my own children became adults.

Time for writing is a big component of my life. Yes, God is right, there’s enough time, although I’m doing the best I can to use it wisely.

What motivates me to write is my age. Imagine when I was in the late Ed Wildman’s writing workshops, I was the second youngest. When I started Headwaters Writers’ Guild for a long time, I was the second oldest. I’m six years older than Colette was when she died. I use this to motivate me to write.

The last two nights I didn’t sleep through the night and it isn’t even the full moon. I thought possibly I should get up to write. Finally, I fell back to sleep around 5:00 a.m. I swear I wasn’t asleep more than ten minutes when I heard a voice in my dream yell,
“NANCY.”

“Leave me alone, I just fell back to sleep.”

Even in dreamtime, I’m reminded to put writing on the top of my things to do.

How do you want to spend your time? Watching TV, checking email, or do you want to live a life fully lived? Do you want to write? Then write.

There’s always enough time.

Blog Roll-Up: Best of the Week's Writing Blogs

Stop Making Excuses
Christine Baker Kline's blog, A Writing Life has a couple guest posts this week about making kids your excuse for not writing. Louise DeSalvo's on Why Having Kids is No Excuse and Lisa Romeo Adds Her Two Cents to the Writer-as-Parent Manifesto. Are you choosing.to rake leaves rather than write?

Social Networking
Jane Friedman of There Are No Rules posts her weekly Best Tweets for Writers. Most of these are links to some great online articles and blog posts.

Are you on LinkedIn? Freelance Folder explains why you might want to be in The Freelancer's Guide to Getting Started on LinkedIn.

Fiction Writing
On QueryTracker.net, Elana Johnson offer tips for finding your voice in Don't Use that Voice With Me!


Rachelle Gardner, Literary Agent, talks about Giving Your Characters Life.Their own life, not yours.


Query Letters
Nathan Bransford, Literary Agent, suggests you Get the Big Stuff Right. He swears that agents won't reject you at the first hint of a typo.


Over at BookEnds, LLC, Jessica Faust helps you get one of the big things right: An Author's Credentials. What do you put in your author bio, especially if you don't have much to add? The good news is: it's all good news.



Just to be on the safe side, A Victoria Mixon, Editor, talks about Getting Credentials that will impress potential agents.


Book Review
On Writing Forward, Melissa Donovan discusses A Poetry Handbook by Mary Oliver.

Member Blogs
What Colour is Your Palette? Diane has been at a painting all this week and shares her experience over at Pens, Paints and Paper. The Ringmaster of the Three-Ring Circus has been busy writing and posts about NaNoWriMo Success.



Weekly Laugh
And finally, The Rejectionist presents the winners of the best rejection letter contest: Author-friends, We Have a Winner.