Writing Journal, 17 January 2024: I can officially call this a small slump

Ugh, as my wife often says about life’s little hassles.

I would say I’m very solidly in an unsettled state. My wife has begun her new job, and as I once did just four years back, I’m closing out the school year and joining her later. Some advantages I have is that this will only be a little more than a four-month process rather than the entire year I had earlier. However, I’m out here now basically by myself. Before, I had my daughter with me in her last year of high school, and two dogs. Now my daughter’s in her last year of college and looking forward to a new career as a chemical engineer¹, and our remaining dog is with Laura. It is frankly disconcerting to be living in a place which has been my home for nearly four years, but will soon be someone else’s, and half the people and things that made it a home are nowhere to be found.

Last week’s totals were slow but not horrific. I can hardly call more than 2,000 words a week to be a slump, but it’s absolutely not up to my standards². Of course, last week I was shut up in my new apartment in Fort Madison frozen in without Internet, so I had that to deal with.

Here’s the totals.

Writing statistics for the week ending 13 January 2024:
2,423 words written.
Days writing: 4 out of 7.
Days revising/planning 3 out of 7 for 210 minutes.
Daily Writing Goals Met: 6 out of 7 days.

I’ll be honest, just opening this computer when I got home and typing this up was a win in and of itself. Hopefully, some of this planning can work out and I can get more productive, strange life situation or not.

See you then.

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1. Hey, Maddie. Also, my son Jake is living alone in Des Moines, so I probably have a better idea of what he goes through sometimes. ↩︎
2. More than 4,000 words in a week is where I want to be. ↩︎