Inclines to Hills

What a day!! Lost my train of thought in middle of scene this morning cuz of my allergy meds. Then my 11yo gets up and he's not feeling well, mostly allergy crap, I think, so we had easy school day. (Yes, we do school on Saturdays, and no, we don't stop for the summer.) I hate it when I can't remember where my brilliance was taking me. Of course, it would have been brilliant. All the lost ideas are fantastic. It's like a rule somewhere. This story just sort of came to me the other day, so the idea is a new shiny and I'm still ironing out the issues :) It's going to be a short/novella. I think. It's SUPPOSED to be anyway. Something to work on whilst I figure out the other things on Search for Sorren.

Roll call for this week: Worked on Search for Sorren (editing AND writing), one of the shorts, a paragraph/idea for the other, and my garden, and crocheted. And where are all those projects?

Search for Sorren: WC 57,737 and 113 pages edited.
Short#1:  6,575 words, and research done on area and some wild animals, and hunting seasons.
Short#2: 94 words, and some ideas, may end up elsewhere as start for novel #3 in the series.
Midwife's Moon: Currently out for edits by CP, staying steady at 20,655, with CP saying first two pages do good job of setting up tension, etc so that's good news :D
Crocheted: Afghan #1: 35%ish (had to redo 1%ish cuz of mistake a few rows back. I probably could have fixed it, but I'm anal retentive when it comes to my arts and crafts.
Afghans 2&3 still at 1%

And, I'm forgetting something... I learned how to do a google document for the style sheet for my The War of the Weres series :) I did said style sheet. More networking/marketing things done as I get reviews, interviews set up. Kinda stalled until my review copies are ready :) Ran invites on my FB author link. Hadn't done that since I set things up.

OH and I ran. And lost weight/inches. *throws confetti*

While running, I had some thoughts. First one, inclines. I have them. Lots. I always kind of thought of it as flat. Well, when I'm in a car, it is mostly flat. I did some magic awesomeness on map my run and saw my inclines. one of them is 16ft over course of about .1 mile, maybe .15ish. Idk. But anyway, 16 ft over .1 isn't that steep, it isn't. Not like my running partner who does a 36 ft hill (and it's apparently not the only hill, or she does it twice or something)

Now, when I first started runnin, I ran to a specific place, then back, then the rest of the run/walk intervals along an actual flat tenth of a mile, back and forth. Well, I got up to 2.7 miles doing that. I had my bits of inclines, but more than half on pure flat. I decided I need to push it harder, get stronger, so I went a bit further up an obvious incline, then back, and again, running on the flat to finish up my time. Well one day, I wanted to really push myself. I ran/walked 2.9 miles, a different route which takes me around an orchard. And guess what? The last .9 miles is all up hill. A gradual hill. But let me tell you, when you're a newbie to running and the last bit is all up hill... yeah.

Now, I go so that one mile of my run is up and down a couple strong inclines, as my everyday run. I'm making 2+ miles so I'm happy. But I got to thinking, as a writer, when we don't know of the bumbs, the problems, the inclines that we face going into writing, it can seem like all flat land, or smooth sailing, to mix my metaphors. But, as we go along, we find out, there's some hard parts in this. You've maybe forgotten grammar you knew, you found out you had to learn to write a query letter, and the days of a writer being a hermit and the publishing house doing the majority of the work (except actually signing the books ;P) are long gone. You have to become a computer guru, internet saavy, instantly understanding the ins and outs, or thought not to be serious in some circles. It's hard work.

What do you do when you come across these inclines? Do you work harder so they become easier? Or do you bypass them, thinking you're doing great, only to find out there's an actual HILL coming up and since you didn't work on the inclines, it's too hard? What can you do?

Writers are a great family of friends. Yes, I said family of friends. It is what we are. Recently, a writer friend, whom I've never met "in person" went into a coma, from toxic shock syndrome. A large number of writers went into a period of grief, all at different levels. Why? Because we are a family. This person was a vibrant, loving, giver, who touched us all. When she went down, we all felt it.

My advice, if you have a sincere wish to be a writer, become a part of our community. Don't do it falsely, be there. Ask questions, offer up encouragement, but don't be fake. Then, when you see that incline, that looks like a mountain, it will only be a mole hill with the help of your writer family. A small bump in the road to becoming a published writer. Conquer those inclines so that when a real hill comes along, you'll be ready.