Words, Miles, and Rest

For the first time in quite a while, I have enough money to pay all my bills and enough work lined up that I won’t be in a panic at the end of the month even with no ETA on finishing a few of long-term ones. Being sick for six months combined with the ensuing recovery time, it started to feel like PANIC!PANIC!PANIC had become my default state again, like I couldn’t quite get my feet up under me again with the unpredictability of freelancing and half of my pets requiring unexpected medical care.

In the past year and a half of freelancing, I’ve picked up a handful of regular clients, about half of whom have me do multiple things for them (like editing and cover art), and a steady stream of regulars means far more to me than a revolving door of new people every month. For one thing, it tells me I must be doing something right if people trust me over and over with their book babies (a trust I do not take lightly), and for another, it reminds me of one of the few good things I miss about my old job–building a rapport and working with great authors to prepare their work for the world.

Of course working nonstop over the past few months means I have horrible wrist pain flaring up again. NSAIDs are no longer safe for me to take, which just leaves me with the option of rest to ease the pain (unless I go asking for prescription painkillers, and I’d rather not).

I’m on a break for three days, housecleaning (dear GOD, the spare room…the spare room…) so I’m not on the keyboard/mouse as much, and I’ll poke at one of my WIPs for my brain. Some people take a break by reading; I like, the Great and Holy Whedon, just switch gears and write a new project as “vacation”. Plus I don’t know about other writers, but for me, sometimes I need to read my own work. I need my voice, my words, my characters, instead of refilling the well with other people’s. So I think this weekend I’ll get working on that cleaned up first draft of Shiva’s Bow; I have a character I had planned to fire, but I’m giving him one more shot to carry his weight. Otherwise, I excise him from the manuscript.

In the last few weeks I’ve finished Rebellion (which I am still hoping you’ll get to read next week, provided I complete revisions on time) and Prey (which is posted for patrons). All told, I’ve written about 170K words in the past three months, so the wheels are turning again in my brain and, once I have a few partial projects here settled, I’ll be on track to write a long novel again at last.

In a similar vein, I’m now running three 12-minute miles a day, which I realize is not super fast but it’s huge for me who is asthmatic and started again back in December barely able to walk for five minutes due to weakness. Next stop: five miles a day, and hopefully eventually ten-minute ones. I want to be running outside by spring, which is going to involve putting away some pennies for new running shoes as mine have split up and down the sides and my toes peek out. That’s made for a fun winter. But anyway.

Have an excellent weekend, my loves.