Auteur : Marie Alice

I can hear you, all the way from my little town drizzled with the first winter snow:

« Stop with the suspense, mama writer, we can’t take it no longer!« 

Since you insist, let’s cut to the chase right away, even if it goes against every storytelling rule I’m aware of!

Drumrolls Drumrolls Drumrolls.

NO!

Indeed, dear fellow writers, the day came.

Our family adopted a little chocolate Labrador. An adorable little furry ball, bright and joyful as can be.

A new writing routine is taking place. Yet again.

The whole thing, exciting but quite mundane after all, triggered a retrospective state.

There were difficult and rather sad months, with a few happy moments in between.

Funny enough, getting a puppy is not one of those fun moments for me, since I’m on the evening, night, and early morning shifts.

And like it is said above: a puppy does NOT help increase the word count.

If I want to accomplish any writing… or take an online writing or literature class…

… well, I’ll have to work harder, sleep less I’m afraid and patiently wait for the puppy to grow up and sleep through the night like the other two upstairs, snoring as the sunlight rises on the first snowfall of the season.

The writing adventures go on.

It’s been a rough couple of weeks.

A hard, shameful wake-up call later, here I am, back on the writing road.

The current writing project I’m working on was supposed to be done by the end of November.

Which

is still doable… if I cut on day job hours, something I clearly cannot do, only a few days from Thanksgiving and all.

Which

is still doable… if I cut on sleep time.

The only way there is if I am to stick to the big writing plan.

Extra motivation is required.

And since it’s November, I thought of finding the motivation through the famous NaNoWriMo gig.

Thirty days. 50K words.

Since there are 30K words left to finish the current manuscript, it may seem like I’m cheating.

Trust me, I’m not. I will have to wake up at 3am more often than I care to count to make it happen.

Wishing you all the good words, fellow writers, and all the positive vibes to all the NaNoWriMo contestants!

It was 4:30 am.

My favourite time of the day.

All alone with the words and a nice, warm mug of tea.

However, this morning…

Little kiddo peeps out of bed, promising to fall back asleep if mama lies down just a tiny bit.

Yeah…………………………………………………………… well………………………………………………….

The second I tippy toes out of the bedroom, we had a nocturn situation.

Which turned into a debate, punctuated by some tears.

See, in the kiddo’s bedroom – illuminated by five nightlights, FYI – there are some real monsters in the shadows. And weird noises. And something behind the mirror door of the closet.

Kiddo was scared body and soul, no matter the number of nightlights or courageous plush toys around, no matter how many we checked the problematic areas, no matter how close mama’s writing nook is from the bedroom.

So.

« Contre mauvaise fortune, bon coeur« , as we say in my little up-North francophone bubble.

By the time I quit trying to reassure my wonderful kiddo, it was nearly time to prep for the day job.

We went downstairs, and I started making lunch while my kiddo started talking about… Halloween of course.

A little tiny bell went « ding-ding » in my brain.

Against the Halloween monsters and spooky things kids at school have been talking about for days now, no mama’s will is strong enough.

Kiddo had a wonderful day. And a wonderful evening, treat-or-tricking in the neighbourhood, then eating much more than « just two candies, papa and mama said ».

And I had a great evening as well, eating some chocolates (not my kiddo’s, promise) while writing, at long last.

Tricky to stick to the big writing plan. But as long as we have fun, fellow writers.

Take care of yourselves, and may all the good words flow your way!