Broke the 20 and Mommy Fears.

Yes indeed...I struggled yesterday to get my writing in. Distractions mounted from all sides, but I did eventually poke my head into the story again and "Broke the 20."

Next up- 30K here I come. That's my next goal- just to break myself down in 10K increments in hopes of not feeling too overwhelmed.

When I finished the previous book, I had no qualms about jumping head first into this one because my heroine had been talking to me a lot while I wrote the other story. Now though I find times it seems she grows quiet and doesn't want to talk to me like she had been....though last night I'd SWEAR I had a dream about the hero, but it's only a vague remembrance of him and I "feel" like it might have been important, but I can't recall details. UGH!

I really need to start keeping a notepad and pen near the bed or the lamp in the bedroom so that I can jot if I think of something in the night. My brain gets very busy, especially before I fall asleep. Ideas seem to start flowing when it's dark and I'm starting to relax and welcome sleep.

When I was younger, if an idea came to me, I would just get up and stay up 1/2 the night if necessary to get it all out. Of course that was when I was single and lived at home with my parents and sister. Now I have a husband and one kid in school and another at home with me(at least for the time being). I know I have to get some sleep in order to get up and make sure the morning routine is taken care of. I can't stay up all night writing...much as I would like to sometimes.

One of my novel ideas came from a dark Gothic picture I used to have on my background for myspace. I found it during a search and I was drawn to it. The picture had dark bluish/purplish tones and a young woman with long long brown hair that came almost to her ankles. She wore a long white dress or gown and she was standing on a rocky shore looking out to sea. There was a tall tower across the way, but that didn't strike my fancy as much as the ghostly ship in the distance with tattered sails and looking as though it was partially sunken. The young woman's expression was stirring- solemn and mournful.

For weeks it haunted me, calling to me and telling me there was a story there.

And I had to tell it.

Every night the image came to me before I fell asleep, making me want to cry, to breath live into this melancholy young woman...her lover lost at sea, but then it became more than that....regret and guilt also emanated from the picture. Perhaps she had betrayed the lover who was gone....fallen in love with someone else while he was away....and worse still...it was his brother~ who had become her companion and friend, her confidant.

From there, my paranormal historical romance was born. I wrote that one at a feverish pace and finished it in about a month last summer.

All my novels/ideas are the stories of my heart, but that one in particular comes to mind when I think of writing from the heart. The days I worked on it were busy, filled with that passionate desire that comes from writing what you love. I wrote like there was no tomorrow, typed till my fingers throbbed and my wrists ached, but at the same time, I got up every morning and all I could think of was getting to the computer as soon as possible, getting lost in that world and seeing how things played out. It wouldn't let me go until the story was completed. (well, other than our computer crash and the few days it took to have all the important stuff retrieved from the old harddrive--the wait was killer.)

If only all my stories flowed out that easily! I'm just as passionate about my current WIP, but we're in a different "place" now, a transition of the end of school drawing nearer, the beginning of spring, which makes my feet itch to be outside, the knowledge that in a couple of weeks we have to go register our daughter for kindergarten- yet another transition that will be a small blessing and a heartache at the same time when she starts school in August and I have more time to myself. That will be lovely, but I've never been separated from my daughter like this, so it's definitely going to be interesting. My biggest fear- her being out in the big ol' world without me and there being nothing I can do to protect or take care or watch over her if she needs me. VERY SCARY.

The past few years have brought great change into my life. Just since mid-2006, I've written 5 novels and am working on the 6th, something I never thought I'd accomplish. I changed my way of thinking about my writing as a priority and it's been amazing. Now I'm facing this upcoming change with my daughter starting school, and I'm excited to think I'll have all day alone to write my little heart out, but this change is something I'm not choosing to do...it's a necessity- she HAS to go to school and I'm not sure I'm really ready for it. It stirs ambivilance within me and I'm sure this love/hate will continue until I'm used to it.

And I'm sure it will also affect my writing- not so much IN the stories, but in how I go about my work. For now, I'm going to take a deep cleansing breath and try not to worry about my baby starting school. And get back to writing! LOL