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Wednesday, October 2, 2013

October 2nd Challenge

Hi, it’s Christina – 
 

Sorry I never posted yesterday, but it was one of those days. It started with my dang fool dog barking his head off at 2:00 am. Although I never saw it, there must have been something on our back porch that riled him up. I closed the sliding door and he settled down, but I had a hard time falling back to sleep afterwards. Then the alarm went off at five. Got my daughter off to school, but then she called saying she forgot her notebook. I took a quick shower, dropped off her book and went over to my girlfriends so I could use her canning stuff so I could prepare all those apples we picked.
 

The canning was finished with only moments to spare to get to the school to pick up my daughter for a doctor’s appointment. It was the first time we were going to this doctor, so of course I took a wrong turn and had to double back. I had forgotten the directions at home, but I could swear they said exit 24A. Apparently they didn’t, because the highway jumped from exit 22B to exit 26A. What dingle-hopper was in charge of numbering the exits?

 
Whatever, by the time I got home, I was toast. So much so, I didn’t even go to my critique group last night. I just didn’t have the energy to drive down to Princeton after driving over 750 miles over the past few days. There was an email from the group leader saying they had twenty people last night, a packed house, so I doubt I was even missed.

 
Today is going to be sucked up by errands, cleaning, laundry and those infernal insurance papers. Sigh… when am I going to find time to be able to write again?? I don’t get it. If I had a “job”, I would not be expected to get this stuff done during “work” hours, but since I’m home…  I really need to put my foot down and say from 9 – 2 I am NOT available to anyone for anything (barring emergencies of course). Those are my “work” hours, and they need to be respected. If I don’t, I’ll never be successful as a writer because I’ll never be able to finish my stories!

 
Who says resolutions are reserved to the first day of the year, month, week? Well, it is Wednesday, the 2nd of October, and I am making my resolution. This is a job, and it needs to be treated as one, by me and everyone else around me. Five hours every day will be devoted to my writing. If my muse decides to take a break during those designated hours, then I will focus on marketing, or editing, or whatever, as long as it has to do with writing or promoting my writing.

 
Today’s blog post will happen as soon as I can get the internet up and running again. Translation: after my hubby wakes up and can fix it for me. I hope you have a day, and happy writing!

 

Your Last Challenge was:

 A song on the radio triggers a strong memory.

 

While we were traveling this past weekend, there were many times when our radio station would fade out and we were forced to search out a new one. Our main objective was finding a country station, but on occasion one occupant or another would ask to stop on a particular song they liked. To keep harmony in the car, these requests were granted, and when the song was over, the hunt for a country station continued.

It was during one of these scans when I had the opportunity to yell “Stop. Go back!” for I had heard the opening notes to an unmistakable song, Bruce Springsteen’s Thunder Road. Suddenly I was no longer a mom, in a minivan, on September 29th, 2013; it was July 7th, 1977 (7/7/77 – that’s how I remember something that happened thirty-six years ago), I was eleven years old and running through Six Flags, Great Adventure with my aunt and her friends.

Although it had been many years since I had heard the song, I remembered all the words and proceeded to sing them at the top of my lungs with a huge grin on my face – much to the dismay of the other occupants in the car, but I didn’t care. For a few minutes, I was a carefree eleven year old.

 

Your Next Challenge is:

 

You have been put in charge of the annual fall fundraiser. You are given carte blanche to pick the activity, theme, everything. The catch, historically this has been the biggest fund raiser of the year, so everyone is really counting on you. There are dozens of volunteers ready to help; you just have to tell them what you have in mind.

 

You have 10 minutes (be honest). There is no right or wrong, just write. Spelling and punctuation don’t count and NO ONE is allowed to criticize what someone else has written. Go.

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