My Writing Life

Right this minute I am sitting with my two-year-old on my lap, who is screaming, "More chocolate milk!" When I tilt my head to the right, she does the same. When I tilt my head to the left, she does the same. So my view of the monitor is intermittent. She also enjoys pushing my hands away from the keyboard repeatedly to make room for a couple of Sesame Street toys who have found a home between my wrists. Every now and then she enjoys hitting the Caps Lock Button because it lights up.

And I wonder if anyone else is writing this way?

I am at the last, probably, 1/6th of my novel (don't know how I came up with that) and I'd love to finish, but I'm distracted during every single sentence I attempt and so instead I find myself yet again googling, "My first draft is shit."

Which gives me a bit of satisfaction that I retrieve so many hits, some sort of comraderie with strangers in cyberspace, but I wonder if all those writers with terrible first drafts wrote in spurts of fifteen minutes, while also moderating fights over Polly Pockets, walking to bus stops, or depleting their town's tissue supply wiping nose after nose.

Just had to get that out.